Frenzied inspections an entree to a strong weanling market?
Interest high ahead of Inglis Australian Weanling Sale at Riverside Stables
It was hectic at Riverside Stables yesterday as an extensive domestic and international buying bench converged on Inglis’s Sydney complex ahead of today’s opening session of the two-day Australian Weanling Sale, the first foal market of the 2022 Australasian season.
After a bumper yearling sale season so far, particularly at the select auctions, there is expected to be significant reinvestment from players in the market prepared to back their judgement and capitalise on the booming demand for horses.
That likely demand was no more evident than for Fairhill Farm’s Mike O’Donnell and his offsider John Jeffs yesterday who oversaw what could only be described as organised chaos as they paraded their draft of 31 weanlings at Barn J in front of a throng of agents and pinhookers from Australia and New Zealand, as well trainers, who cast their eye over the breeder’s entire foal crop.
The sustained action underlined the buyer interest in the weanlings, many potential purchasers who have done well trading stock from last year’s foal sales into this year’s yearling market.
Trainers and owners – the end users – are also expected to take an ever-growing interest in the weanling market as the increasing prices of yearlings forces some buyers to seek alternative ways of securing racing stock.
The 417-lot Australian Weanling Sale – to be followed by the Magic Millions National Weanling Sale, the Inglis Great Southern Sale and the New Zealand Bloodstock National Weanling Sale over the next six weeks – will almost certainly set the tone for the market in May and June.
Leading trainers Ciaron Maher and David Eustace, a major force at the yearling market, have been sourcing weanlings at the sales for up to $1 million with the intention of racing them while they have also bought select sale quality horses privately in an attempt to find value for their clients.
Will Bourne, the bloodstock manager for Ciaron Maher Racing, was not given an invitation to the Warrnambool carnival but instead was sent to Sydney to inspect weanlings this week.
Wyong-based trainer Tracey Bartley, who bought two horses at the HTBA May Yearling Sale on Sunday, was back at Riverside Stables yesterday looking at the young stock.
“I think there are foals at all levels of the market who have the capacity to appeal not just to pinhookers but end users as well,” Inglis Bloodstock chief executive Sebastian Hutch told ANZ Bloodstock News yesterday.
“That was a form of participant in the market that got a lot of coverage last year, so I don’t think it’s necessarily a new development, but it’s just a little bit more prominent than what it had been in the past. However, a lot of the end users’ participation is contingent on the quality of the stock.
“We have a really strong yearling market, so if people feel there’s stock that has the capacity to be good value in the context of the yearling market they will be participating (today and tomorrow), but again we let the buyers make their mind up about that.”
A strong New Zealand contingent, organised by Brett Gilding and Inglis’s Kiwi representative Dean Hawthorne, includes Landsdowne Park’s Dave Duley and agent Bruce Perry, while NZB’s director of sales Danny Rolston was also at the complex yesterday.
“With travel restrictions having been eased – and we’ve endured challenges at each of the past two Sydney weanling sales – anyone who can be here is here this year,” Hutch said.
“It’s got a great feel to it, the good horses are going to be really well found. I feel like there will be buyers who go home disappointed because there probably aren’t going to be enough good horses to satisfy demand in the market but we’ll do as many good results as we can.”
This week’s weanling sale features first crop foals by 20 freshman sires, including Too Darn Hot (Dubawi), Pierata (Pierro), Alabama Express (Redoute’s Choice), Royal Meeting (Invincible Spirit), Yes Yes Yes (Rubick), Cosmic Force (Deep Field), Magna Grecia (Invincible Spirit) and D’Argento (So You Think).
Bowness Stud’s John North will offer nine of the ten weanlings at the Sydney sale by his resident first season Rosehill Guineas (Gr 1, 1600m) winning sire D’Argento, a horse who possessed “a Chautauqua-like finish”, and he has been pleased by the early feedback he has received during inspections from potential buyers.
“They’re all forward looking types and they’ve got a lot of strength behind the saddle, which we didn’t expect to see from a middle-distance stallion, but having said that he did win over 1400 metres and he was probably a better miler, having been beaten a lip by Hartnell in the Epsom coming from last.
“He had that ‘Chautauqua-like’ finish, coming from the tail of the field and he could really sprint at the end of his races, so I think there’s going to be good demand for them.
“There is a lot of interest in him, particularly from New Zealand, I think he’d be sensational over there at Karaka as well.
“We’re very bullish on him and the feedback we’re getting from people looking at them at this sale now has been very, very encouraging.”
North hopes this week’s weanling market will follow the lead of the record yearling sales which have taken place this year.
“You always worry in a federal election year if there’s going to be some hesitancy but it just seems to at the moment, and over the past 12 months with Covid and everything, that the market just continues to defy all logic,” he said.
“The predictions we were getting two years ago with the pandemic were that the bottom was going to fall out of the industry, but it has just gone from strength to strength and there’s no rhyme or reason for it.”
Coolmore is also showcasing the first southern hemisphere-bred weanlings by Magna Grecia, the dual Group 1 winner who is also a half-brother to the operation’s 2022 new season shuttler, five-time Group 1 winner St Mark’s Basilica (Siyouni).
There are nine Magna Grecia lots to be auctioned over the next two days.
“As is typical of the Invincible Spirit sire line, Magna Grecia is a particularly impressive individual and he has stamped his stock with his own great quality. He himself was a high-priced weanling who went on to win Group 1s at two and three and we expect him to have a very strong sale on Wednesday and Thursday at Inglis,” Coolmore Australia’s Emma Pugsley said.
“The Invincible Spirit sire line is proven in Australia. In such a type-orientated yearling market and the quality that Magna Grecia is producing, we expect him to be well sought after at the yearling sales next year.
“We believe he represents a great opportunity for pinhookers.”
The two-day Inglis Australian Weanling Sale starts at 10am while the Inglis Chairman’s sale for elite mares will be conducted from 4.30pm on Friday.