Southern hemisphere buyers set to play a starring role at Tattersalls Autumn Horses In Training Sale
Lydia Symonds
Global bloodstock editor
The Tattersalls Autumn Horses In Training Sale (HIT) gets underway in Newmarket on Monday and it is a sale that has become an annual pilgrimage for many buyers from the southern hemisphere, who are expected to be active once again this week.
The Newmarked-based auction, the world’s largest horses in training sale, has built a reputation as an important outlet for top-end talent and the sale’s growing popularity can be backed up by the numbers. The winners of 183 Australian stakes races have been unearthed at the auction and perhaps more importantly, 24 of those successes were gained in Group 1 company.
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“Buyers from the southern hemisphere have been targeting this sale for approximately 15 years, Chris Waller set the ball rolling, coming here and buying cheap horses in training at the Tatts Autumn Horses In Training sale specifically, taking them down and doing very well with them. Since then more people have cottoned on to it and there have been endless success stories from the sale,” Jason Singh, Tattersalls’ associate director of marketing, told ANZ News.
Last year the auction made headlines when Coolmore sold their then Group 3 winner known as ‘Delius’ to Sir Owen Glenn’s Go Bloodstock, De Burgh Equine, trainers Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott and Johnny and Susie McKeever for a sale record price of 1,300,000gns, eclipsing the previous benchmark of 1,000,000gns.
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Now raced as Sir Delius, the son of Frankel (Galileo) has not only justified that mammoth price tag, but also enhanced the reputation of the sale further. The five-year-old announced himself as a horse to follow, kicking off his career in Australia in style with a victory in the Chairman’s Handicap (Gr 3, 2000m) at Doomben back in May.
This preparation Sir Delius has collected two victories at Group 1 level, producing a stylish win over subsequent Cox Plate (Gr 1, 2040m) runner-up Buckaroo (Fastnet Rock) in the Underwood Stakes (Gr 1, 1800m) and then easily accounted for Via Sistina (Fastnet Rock), the winner of The Valley showpiece, in the Turnbull Stakes (Gr 1, 2000m).
While it has not been plain sailing for the star performer since those victories, with stringent vet checks ruling him out of his planned runs in the Cox Plate and Melbourne Cup (Gr 1, 3200m), he looks a safe bet to dominate middle distance races during the Sydney Autumn Carnival.
“I feel sorry for the Sir Delius connections that he wasn’t allowed to run in the Cox Plate and Melbourne Cup, but at least they have won a couple of Group 1s with him this spring. There is no better example of what can be bought at the Tattersalls Autumn Horses In Training Sale than him,” Singh said.
“You don’t normally get horses making that much at this sale, but I think it's recognition of what can be bought here. We’re doing adverts at the moment which I think illustrate perfectly what you can buy.
“I think since 2022, purchases from the HIT have won 173 Group and Listed races - that was our last advert and since then we have had Onesmoothoperator win the Moonee Valley Gold Cup and Spartan Arrow won a Group 3 at Dundalk, he was purchased last year for only 17,000gns, so the number climbs all the time. Even Onesmoothoperator cost his connections 65,000gns in 2021, so they are both great advertisements on the eve of the sale.”
The sale’s success this year has far from been about one horse. Royal Patronage (Wootton Bassett), a 300,000gns pick up for the McKeever Bloodstock, Waterhouse and Bott axis from the WH Bloodstock draft in 2023, proved his worth when winning the Canterbury Stakes (Gr 1, 1300m).
Meanwhile, Our Anchorage (Galileo) won last season’s Parramatta Cup (Listed, 1900m), having been bought by Hubie de Burgh and Darby Racing for 60,000gns in 2022. Also purchased at that edition was the Australia Day Cup (Listed, 2400m) winner Tajanis (Australia), who was a 40,000gns purchase by Albert Bosma’s Go Racing NZ.
“Chris Waller set the ball rolling, coming here and buying cheap horses in training at the Tatts Autumn Horses In Training sale specifically, taking them down and doing very well with them. Since then more people have cottoned on
While the big prices garner much of the attention, Tajanis and Our Anchorage are two of many horses that show buyers do not need to have thick wallets for success.
“The fact is that every year there are horses who succeed across all different price points and I truly believe it presents something for everybody,” said Singh.
“There have been 15 individual Group 1 winners in Australia bought at this sale at every price point. Going back in time a bit, but the likes of My Kingdom of Fife he only cost 60,000gns, Fierce Impact he only cost 120,000gns, Foreteller, was one of Chris’s early horses and he only cost 100,000gns.
“The great thing for us, you can do as much advertising as you like, but in a way the best advert is what happens every Saturday. People can see European-breds winning races down there every Saturday, whether it’s Melbourne or Sydney or further afield and a lot of those horses are coming from this sale.”
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Few have added to the reputation of the Autumn Horses in Training Sale in the southern hemisphere quite so successfully as Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott.
Aside from Sir Delius and Royal Patronage, Tulloch Lodge have won The Metropolitan (Gr 1, 2,400m) in 2023 with 300,000gns purchase Just Fine (Sea The Stars), while Knights Order (So You Think), a 250,000gns buy, landed the 2022 Sydney Cup (Gr 1, 3200m). The stable also struck in the same two races when Waterhouse was the sole licence holder, taking out the 2012 Metropolitan with Glencadam Gold (Refuse To Bend) (135,000gns) and the 2014 Sydney Cup with The Offer (Montjeu) (200,000gns).
“If you finally get a horse that has an interesting form, looks nice and passes the vet, everyone else will bid on that horse too
All six of their top-flight winners were sourced from Tattersalls with the help of Johnny and Susie McKeever of McKeever Bloodstock, who, alongside Claudia Fitzgerald, bloodstock manager for the powerhouse operation, will renew their combined talent search with the stable at Tattersalls this week.
“It’s like detective work,” Johnny McKeever told ANZ News of the buying strategy. “You have to put all the horses through sieves. The first sieve is whether their form is interesting enough and if it is, you pass them through the second: What do they look like? Then the vet comes along and they have a very thin mesh and nine times out of ten and they fail the vet. If you finally get a horse that has an interesting form, looks nice and passes the vet, everyone else will bid on that horse too.”
When asked if there are any common traits between the horses Tulloch Lodge has invested in at the sale, McKeever said: “They are all extremely good looking horses and all conform to what Gai and Adrian like; very strong and athletic horses.
“They also conform to a certain type of physique, which we’ve come to the conclusion suits Australia well. Some of our purchases have come through the ranks like Just Fine, who was a handicapper when we bought him and he elevated himself and some, like Royal Patronage, who was a Group-winning two-year-old, we knew he was Group class, but he’d come a weird route having been trained in America for a year, so it was a bit more a gamble.
“Sir Delius was obviously a Group winner when we bought him, but was lightly raced and he was big and rangy, so you could imagine there was improvement to come.”
While the sale serves Australian buyers well, it is a swinging door in terms of what they bring to the table for the sales company. Since 2021 there has been a steady rise in the market share held by the buyers from Australia.
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Last year, Australians bought 29 lots for an aggregate of 6,500,000gns, 18 per cent of the sale’s turnover, while in 2023 they spent 5,700,000gns, accounting for 16 per cent of the overall market. In 2022, Australians shelled out 6,000,000gns on 36 lots, making up 17 per cent of the market while the previous year they accounted for 11 per cent, having spent 3,700,000gns on 34 horses.
Australian spend at Tattersalls Autumn HIT
| Year | Bought | Spend (gns) | % market share |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 | 29 | 6,500,000 | 18% |
| 2023 | 43 | 5,700,000 | 16% |
| 2022 | 36 | 6,000,000 | 17% |
| 2021 | 34 | 3,700,000 | 11% |
Singh anticipates this trend will continue with many southern hemisphere-based buyers expected to be out in force scanning the grounds in search of the next track star.
Despite the sale falling in the thick of the spring carnival, the big names tipped to be in attendance this year include Guy Mulcaster, talent scout for Waller, Ciaron Maher’s bloodstock manager Will Bourne and Annabel Archibald, who will be on the hunt for her next Zaaki (Leroidesanimaux). The trainer’s multiple Group 1-winning star was bought at the sale alongside Blandford Bloodstock’s Stuart Boman for 150,000gns in 2020. Other southern hemisphere buyers are also expected to be active through various European bloodstock agents.
Singh said: “We recognise that this sale isn’t at the perfect time for the principal trainers to actually come up themselves, but they are always well-represented and there are plenty of European bloodstock agents.”
Josh Rix, bloodstock manager at the powerful Lindsay Park operation, will also be among those trying to source stock to bolster their ranks.
Rix has arrived at Tattersalls for the Autumn Horses In Training Sale after an action-packed month sourcing northern hemisphere-bred yearlings for the Hayes brothers. His attendance at the horses in training sale is another way the stable are widening the net to give themselves more opportunities to compete in lucrative middle distances races.
“I’ve had a busy couple of weeks. We bought two yearlings at Book 2, two at Arqana and we also went in with OTI on a horse from the Arc sale,” Rix told ANZ News.
“We have a lot of support from our owners and it is definitely a stable driven strategy. We are obviously leading the charge with our yearling purchases and our two-year-olds, but we do need to start building on the depth of our stayers in the stable.
“Obviously, the prize-money is heavily weighted towards the staying races in Australia, so to chase that you’ve got to go find the better horses for that and that leads you over here. It’s what the owners want, so it’s a matter of providing for our owners, but also looking at our business and what the stable needs - so it’s a bit of both. We have Mr Brightside, who is still acquitting himself very well and Evaporate, but if you look at the bigger stables they’ve got a lot of those sorts and we have to widen our net for more of those horses.”
Rix said Ben, JD and Will Hayes have done an enormous job to drum up support from the owners, something Tattersalls has also helped with.
“There are plenty of banner horses for the sale, which makes it easier to sell the horses from here, like Zaaki. It is a sale that does resonate with a lot of Aussies. For us to spend this amount of money there has to be a bit of lead in and ground work because we don’t have those really big clients who can come in and buy those $1 million horses, so the boys have hosted lunches and Tatts have come down and be part of that with us for the awareness.
“With all of that, they are putting in the effort to encourage us to get up here and we'll be lining up clients who have shown their interest and getting behind the stable, so we’re prepared for what we’re doing up here.”
“It is a sale that does resonate with a lot of Aussies. For us to spend this amount of money there has to be a bit of lead in and ground work because we don’t have those really big clients who can come in and buy those $1 million horses
With over 1,600 horses catalogued for the five-day selling bonanza, the Lindsay Park team have called upon bloodstock agent Jamie McCalmont to help comb through the catalogue in search of horses who fit the criteria.
Rix said: “We decided this year we’d work with Jamie McCalmont. He has got ties to the stable through one of his big clients and we wanted to work with someone who wasn’t working with a lot of other trainers so that we were his first port of call and option. So he has been diving into the form.
“I sat down with him [Saturday] night and we went over the shortlist that he had compiled. We then looked at the form, bit of the breeding and the race replays, so we are accessing a horse on its own merit. We are looking at its action and what ground it runs on, obviously we get the firmer tracks at home so that is pretty important for us. Then [Sunday] we are going to look at the physicals, trot them up and see their action and if we like what we see we’ll then vet, which is the stage you lose a few.
“We’ve come up with a really nice shortlist of what we think fit the criteria. It’s a mixed bag with so many horses catalogued, but we definitely think we’ve found some horses, provided they pass the vet, we’d love to have in the stable.”
Horses featured in the catalogue likely to be of interest to visitors from the southern hemisphere include Tattersalls Gold Cup (Gr 1, 1m 2.5f) winner White Birch (Ulysses) (Lot 709), Molveno (Almanzor) (Lot 1110A), winner of the Italian Derby (Gr 2, 2200m) and German Group 2 scorer Geography (Holy Roman Emperor) (Lot 726A).
Singh believes there is a strong group of horses assembled for this year’s sale.
“The great thing is that year-in-year out, what is on offer at the sale tends to be fairly constant,” he said. “There has been a bit of a trend over the last few years to bring more of those sorts of horses to market whereas previously some of them would have been done privately.
“It is a pretty decent catalogue this year. A horse like White Birch, a Tattersalls Gold Cup winner, ran very respectively in the Irish Champion Stakes two starts ago and finished midfield in the Arc last start. There isn’t much difference to his form than Sir Delius’s even though he’s a little bit older.
“Geography also looks quite exciting and Marco Botti has Italian Derby winner Molveno. Like all sales, there are obvious standouts, but there are plenty of other horses in there which have very progressive form over a middle distance which suits Australia.”
The Tattersalls Autumn Horses in Training Sale runs from Monday to Friday, with sessions starting at 9.30am local time (19.30 AEST).
