Harron makes mark at Fasig-Tipton’s Night of the Stars
Emro bought with Frankel in mind as Coolmore dominates with US$7 million mare purchase
James Harron was amongst the thick of the action at Fasig-Tipton’s Night of the Stars elite breeding stock sale in the US, with the Australia-based agent’s global industry view on full display, with the second and most expensive of his two purchases in the US yesterday destined for a date with Europe’s champion sire Frankel (Galileo).
The expatriate Irishman, one of the leading agents in the southern hemisphere, was one of three Australian buyers active at the 320-lot sale, which saw the trade of 31 seven-figure mares up to a top price of US$7 million (approx. AU$10.8 million).
Leading international operation Coolmore, Japan’s Katsumi Yoshida and China Horse Club, which has racing and breeding interests around the world with a major presence in Australia, also featured on the buyers’ sheet at the Fasig-Tipton auction in Lexington, Kentucky.
Harron, meanwhile, bought Emro (Point Of Entry), a juvenile Listed stakes winner who was sold in foal to exciting sire Constitution (Tapit), for an existing group of clients involved in the agent’s elite broodmare partnership.
He paid US$425,000 (approx. A$662,602) for Emro, dubbing the four-year-old mare “gorgeous”. She’s raced just four times, winning three, for trainer Brad Cox. She will remain in America to foal down early next year.
“Obviously, Constitution has been doing an amazing job, he’s got some big crops to run for him, so we’ll sell that resulting progeny back into the market here in America and the idea will be to send the mare to Frankel to southern hemisphere time (next September),” Harron told ANZ Bloodstock News from the US yesterday.
“We thought it was a good play in a very buoyant market… to be able to sell the resulting foal back into the market here, be it as a weanling or a yearling, and then we’ll ship the mare across to England and hopefully, all things being equal, we’ll bring her back to Australia in foal to Frankel.”
Emro’s winning dam Grand Finesse (Grand Slam) is a half-sister to stakes winners Kodema (Seeking The Gold), Mistress S (Kris S) and the stakes-placed Viz (Kris S), herself a proven broodmare being the dam of European stakes winners Secret Charm (Green Desert) and Relish The Thought (Sadler’s Wells). Their dam Shapiro’s Mistress (Unpredictable) is a half-sister to former shuttle sire Brocco (Kris S).
WinStar Farm stallion Constitution is the sire of 41 stakes winners, nine of them at Grade 1 level, from six crops of racing age.
Juddmonte Farm’s Frankel is making a big impression with his progeny, both in Europe and Australia, and Harron plans to tap into the champion sire’s increasing appeal in the southern hemisphere.
“He’s got some really good numbers coming onto the ground now in Australia, so I just want to get onto the back of that as he is an absolute sire sensation,” he said.
“Very few stallions can do it all over the world, which he is doing in both hemispheres, so I want to take full advantage of that while we can.”
Harron earlier went to US$350,000 (approx. A$545,025) for rising four-year-old Miss Alacrity (Munnings) on behalf of his Victorian client, Morningside’s Mark, Tom and Will Rowsthorn.
A stakes-winning juvenile for trainer Wesley Ward last season, the Eaton Sales-consigned Miss Alacrity (Munnings) is a half-sister to the stakes winner Jenda’s Agenda (Proud Citizen), herself already the dam of Grade 3 winner Just Cindy (Justify). She was catalogued as Lot 204.
“She’s obviously an American speed mare and they have been doing such an amazing job in Australia and she fits into that profile perfectly,” Harron said of Miss Alacrity.
“She was very fast, very precocious, she’s a total outcross blood to Danehill and I think she’ll slot in really well to the Australian theme. She is a real Aussie type, so to speak; very strong, very fast looking, great substance, so she really fitted that criteria well.”
Harron has linked with Morningside this year, purchasing five mares across the Inglis Chairman’s and Magic Millions National sales in May for a combined $3.255 million.
“They are building up a beautiful broodmare band and they’re committed to getting a really good long-term thinking group of mares together, breeding them well on a magnificent farm, so it was lovely to get her (to add to the group),” the agent said.
Soon after Harron purchased Miss Alacrity, Scone-based Kia Ora Stud went to US$400,000 (approx. A$622,886) for Grade 2 winner Miss Leslie (Paynter), a three-time juvenile winner who was offered by vendor Elite as a breeding prospect, catalogued as Lot 207.
“The reports came back that she was a very nice type physically. There’s a criteria that we like to meet: they have to be a good two-year-old, which she was, and she was a stakes winner and not only was she a stakes winner, she won the Group 2 by 12 lengths,” Kia Ora’s Shane Wright said.
“There are lines we think that will cross very well with our stallions down here and if you buy these sorts of mares with very good two-year-old form and stakes form, you’ve got stallions here that suit them very well.”
Kia Ora is the breeder of Group 1-winning sprinter and Newgate Farm stallion Wild Ruler (Snitzel), who is out of American mare Gypsy Robin (Daaher), also the dam of last week’s VRC Oaks (Gr 1, 2500m) runner-up Pavitra (American Pharoah). Gypsy Robin was purchased in 2013 by Kia Ora’s then–stud manager Alex Kingston from the Keeneland Breeding Stock Sale for US$750,000.
“Kia Ora has always loved the US bloodlines, bringing them back here and getting a little bit of a mixture with the colonial stallions,” Wright said.
“Gypsy Robin is the dam of Wild Ruler and Pavitra, who was placed in our colours in the Oaks last week, so she is a very good mare, but Inglorious was bought at the North American sales and she is the dam of (the stakes-placed filly) Miss Canada and even the Breeders Cup winner More Than Real, she was brought down and she’s subsequently the dam of Miss Debutant who has produced Queen Of The Ball and Platinum Jubilee, they’re both two-year-old stakes winners.
“A lot of farms now, Newgate and others, are really going strong in the American market, which you can see with the strength of the market at Fasig. It’s been phenomenal over there what they’re making. It’s a different ball game (compared to Australia for the elite mares).”
Mitchell Bloodstock’s James Mitchell also got his name on the buyers’ sheet yesterday after purchasing a weanling filly by Audible (Into Mischief) for US$85,000 (approx. A$132,504).
The filly is a daughter of the stakes-winning Bonnie Blue Flag (Mineshaft), herself the second dam of China Horse Club’s top-class entire Life Is Good (Into Mischief) who set the pace in Saturday’s Breeders’ Cup Classic (Gr 1, 1m2f) won by Flightline (Tapit). She was catalogued as Lot 133.
Coolmore’s MV Magnier, as he and brother Tom have done often at bloodstock sales around the world, made his presence felt at the sale, purchasing the US$7 million (approx. A$10.83 million) sale-topping Gamine (Into Mischief), the champion sprinter of 2020 who was sold in foal to Quality Road (Elusive Quality) by Hill ‘N’ Dale as agent.
Magnier also signed for the second highest-priced mare at the one-season sale, going to US$5 million (approx. $7.795 million) for Campanelle (Kodiac), a two-time Group 1 winner in Europe who was crowned the joint champion two-year-old in Great Britain in 2020.
Magnier also paid US$4 million (A$6.22 million) for three-time Grade 1 winner Bellafina (Quality Road), who was offered in foal to Tiz The Law (Constitution) by Eaton Sales as agent, and US$1.9 million for Donna Veloce (Uncle Mo) who was also sold in foal to Tiz The Law. Agent Jamie McCalmont purchased Donna Veloca as agent for Magnier.
Leading Japanese breeder Katsumi Yoshida bought five mares, four of them million dollar lots, while China Horse Club took home Grade 2 winner Princess Grace (Karakontie) for US$1.7 million (A$2.643 million).
Yesterday’s Fasig-Tipton sale grossed US$101,214,000 (A$157,371,070) at an average of US$598,899 (A$931,189) and a median of US$250,000 (A$388,708) from 169 lots sold, but ones nonetheless that were down on last year’s sale which achieved an average of US$695,966 (A$1.082 million) from 149 lots traded.
The US breeding stock sales move across town with the Keeneland November Sale starting today, where the extensive Australian buying bench is expected to ramp up its spending in a bid to source quality outcross mares to bring Down Under.