Mills strikes online for $525,000 to snare Ridgeport’s Zoustar filly in Perth
Sparks flew early on day one of Thursday’s Magic Millions Perth Yearling Sale when a filly by Australia’s reigning champion sire Zoustar (Northern Meteor) out of Group 3 winner Lubiton (Snitzel) topped proceedings, selling to Sheamus Mills Bloodstock for $525,000.
Mills, bidding online from his home state of Victoria, delivered the final blow to outlast bloodstock agent Johnny McKeever and trainer Annabel Archibald.
Archibald, alongside husband and training partner Rob, will saddle the filly’s I Am Invincible (Invincible Spirit) half-sister Chayan as a $26 chance in Saturday’s Blue Diamond Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m) at Caulfield and Mills is hoping for a timely pedigree update.
“That would be a bit of a dream scenario, but not without a chance,” Mills told ANZ News. “She ran well on debut, so in probably a fairly open race hopefully she can make her presence felt.”
On a fly-in, fly-out mission to Western Australia, Mills said the filly was not initially on his shopping list but proved impossible to leave behind after he inspected her at the beginning of the week.
“I came over on Tuesday and looked at about 50 or 60, and came home Wednesday,” he said.
“I like the medium-sized, athletic Zoustars who stand over plenty of ground. She had a lovely sort of shape to her, she wasn’t too heavy and she moved particularly well.
“Her number one attribute I liked was her personality. I thought she’s a lovely, tough filly, very settled. I saw her when I first got there, and then I saw her just before they closed up at the end of the day, and the girl who led her said she’d had her ears walked off by the end of the day and had been very popular.
“I could see how tired she was, but when she was asked to walk, you wouldn’t have known the day that she’d had. She’s obviously held up very well and that little glimpse into her temperament sealed the deal.”
Selling for $525,000, the filly became the second highest-priced filly ever sold at the Perth sale, second only to a filly Mills purchased for $625,000 at the 2024 renewal. Named Fight For Life (Playing God), who sadly died without making a racecourse appearance.
Mills did not attend in 2025 but returned this year with a specific target in mind, the sister to Fight For Life, catalogued as Lot 154, who was eventually knocked down to Pearce Racing for $475,000 later in the day.
“I suppose the original reason was to come and see the sister [to Fight For Life] and going that far, there were certainly enough other horses in the catalogue of interest. I had a few other little jobs to do in terms of other clients who were interested in various horses.”
Mills said a trainer for the Zoustar filly had yet to be finalised.
“Not really sure at the moment [who will train]. We put all the horses through the same process and then we’ll work them out at the end. The majority obviously go to Mick Price, but we do have a couple of horses with Waller and Malua Racing. So we’ll just see, once we learn a little bit more about her.”
The result marked a strong return for Ridgeport Farm, who bought Lubiton carrying the filly for $400,000 from Longwood Thoroughbred Farm at the 2024 Magic Millions Gold Coast National Broodmare Sale.
“She’s a beautiful filly. We were so excited and so glad she has gone to a good home,” Ridgeport Farm’s Vaughan Lees told ANZ News.
“It’s a team effort. We are a small, close knit team, so thank you to all of the staff here and at home as well. Our farrier Ben, Dwayne our farm manager – they’re all doing their part. And to Santo, he’s amazing and we are very excited for everyone.”
Lees said the filly had all standout attributes.
“Her attitude and movement, she has the attributes to make a good horse,” he said. “There was good competition for her, Annabel even flew over, obviously having the half-sister, and the mare is actually back in foal to I Am Invincible, so exciting times ahead.”
“She’s one out of the box that you hope you could breed more of, and we are trying. We have got a lovely draft.”
Lubiton, who foaled the filly at Yarraman Park Stud, remained there and missed to Brave Smash (Tosen Phantom) in 2024, but after scanning in foal to I Am Invincible in 2025 has since moved to Ridgeport Farm in Waroona.
At the close of trade on the first day of the two-day sale, the auction had returned healthy numbers at the top end and through the middle market, with 138 yearlings sold at a clearance rate of 82.14 per cent clearance, with an impressive 22 lots making over $200,000.
The aggregate rose 9.7 per cent from last year’s corresponding session to $14,737,500, while the average weighed in at $106,793, up 20.8 per cent and the median increased 14.2 per cent to $80,000.
Magic Millions’ Western Australia manager David Houston said the opening session set a strong platform heading into the second and final day.
“It has been a super day today,” Houston told ANZ News. “To be up $20,000 on average selling 20 horses less than last year and up a million dollars in gross, it is fantastic.
“The number of people who have gone home without a horse tonight, but hopefully will be back tomorrow.
“The interstate buyers were very, very strong today. The locals were super strong again. I’m thrilled for the vendors to be able to get such a result. It’s great that so many of the horses are going to go into good stables, which will only give us a good future here in WA.
“I think tomorrow I’ll be strong again. There’s obviously not so many horses to go through, it’ll be a shorter day, but there have been a lot of good horses come out of day two and there’ll be great value there.
“I spoke to a number of the buyers or potential buyers today and they have missed out, so they’ll be looking tomorrow to fill their orders as well, so I’m very hopeful for tomorrow.”
Sale statistics – Day 1
2026 2025
Catalogued 182 190
Offered 168 177
Sold 138 (82%) 152 (86%)
Aggregate $14,737,500 (+9.7%) $13,433,500
Average $106,793 (+20.8%) $88,378
Median $80,000 (+14.2%) $70,000
Top Lot $525,000 $450,000
Team Pearce go hard on day one
One of Western Australia’s leading training partnerships Daniel and Ben Pearce were among the busiest buyers on day one, securing nine lots throughout the session in various partnerships and independently.
Their first notable purchase came when they signed for a colt by Playing God (Blackfriars) out of four-time winner Amthaal (Lonhro) from the Greenfields Lodge draft for $360,000.
“He’s a lovely colt,” Ben Pearce told ANZ News. “We came here last year, to try and buy what we thought was the best Playing God colt, and we got the Playing God from Superstardom, and we’re really happy with him. He’s coming through well and we had the same plan this year, so we think we’ve got one of the nicest Playing Gold colts here.”
Pearce praised the ongoing dominance of Darling View Thoroughbreds’ leading sire.
He said: “He keeps doing it everywhere. He’s had a two-year-old Magic Millions winner and a group One over 1800 metres. He’s done a fantastic job as a stallion.”
He also highlighted the strength of the local industry and incentives on offer.
“We got a ladies horse, the girls just purchased it. The prize-money is good and WestSpeed as well. There’s plenty of prize-money on offer.
“I think there’s plenty of nice horses around. There’s a lot of positivity around. I think the industry is in a good place.”
A few lots later, the Pearce brothers struck for another by the stallion, securing a filly in partnership with Geisel Park and Boomer Bloodstock for $475,000.
From the Mungrup draft, the filly is out of Cosmah Domination (Oratorio), a sister to the star-crossed sale-topper Fight For Life purchased by Mills in 2024 and Group 1 winner Bustler, as well as a half-sister to Group 2 winner A Lot Of Good Men (A Lot).
“She’s got residual value that she’ll have forever,” Daniel Pearce told ANZ News. “Obviously, the half to two very good horses. We loved the sister two years ago, and we were out bid on that.
“I think this filly is as good, if not better, than the one two years ago and we were able to buy her cheaper than that one went for. We’re really happy to get her and can’t wait to get her back at the stable. She looks sharp enough, so we’ll just get her into the system and see what we make of her.”
“We’ve got some good owners behind us and some good studs that we train for. So we are excited to put a good ownership group together to race her.”
Young returns to Perth
Another familiar face at the Swan Valley complex was last year’s record-breaking buyer Idan Young, who returned to secure a colt by Darley shuttler Pinatubo (Shamardal) out of nine-time winning Listed-placed mare Wilchino (Maschino) for $360,000.
Set to join the Dan Morton stable, Young said the colt’s physicality stood out during inspections.
“Danny, who trains my horses, trained the mum who won nine races, but what I liked about him is he reminded me of the first crop of I Am Invincibles, short coupled, really strong, and I’m hoping that the sire side can help the mum’s side stretch out the 1400. I just thought he was lovely.”
“I don’t have much other than horses and my family and business, so I love horses and I don’t think we saw the best from the mum and arguably if she didn’t get heat stroke, she maybe would have won the Winterbottom, then he would have been even dearer. I’m happy to buy him, I thought he was maybe a bit dear, but that’s life.”
Spirited bidding unfolded ringside, with Young joined by a group of owners connected to the colt’s dam.
“I was laughing, the boys said ‘not the top lot again’. I’m glad that someone paid 500, so it takes the heat off me’,” Young said.
“I met them 15 minutes ago,” Young laughed, when asked if the guys alongside were his friends. “Danny said they owned the mum. And they said, is there any chance if you buy him, we could grab your share in it? So I said, well, yes, how could I resist? So there’ll be a big winners circle and a big fun group.”
The Book 2 session gets under way at 10am (WST) on Friday.