SEVEN FIGURES AT MAGIC MILLIONS GOLD COAST YEARLING SALE

Click above to watch the sale of Lot 251 - Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale
(Image and footage : Magic Millions)

MAGIC MILLIONS GOLD COAST YEARLING SALE
Gold Coast, Queensland
9 - 15 January 2013

The Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale recorded its first seven-figure price since 2011 yesterday and highest since 2009 - when lot 251, a colt by sire-of-the-moment Fastnet Rock (Aus), fetched a final bid of A$1.35 million (US$1,417,500) from Coolmore early during Thursday’s session.

Tom Magnier had the highest bid on a day that saw 138 youngsters sell for A$18,742,500. Over the course of the first two sessions, the average stood at A$132,289, compared to A$127,977 12 months ago.

“The sale went through a soft patch for a while, but improved and the last three hours went very well,” Magic Millions Managing Director Vin Cox said at the end of the second session. “We’re keen to see the clearance rate continue to rise, and it won’t be long before hitting 80%. A goal would be to get to 85% - if that was achieved, it would be phenomenal. There’s been some great bidding duels over the two days so far and there’s also been some great value on offer.” Cox added, “We’ve still got some high quality lots to go under the hammer during tomorrow’s third session and Saturday night’s session four.”

Lot 251 sauntered into the ring and auctioneer Grant Burns received an opening bid of A$400,000 and announced that the colt was “on the market.” With offers coming from dining tables and the Coolmore group to the left of the auctioneers’ stand, the money climbed to A$900,000. It inched up in increments from there and, though agent James Harron hung in gamely, Magnier won out in the end.

“He’s by a great stallion and was probably the colt of the sale,” Magnier said immediately after lot 251 left the ring. “I hope he is lucky, and we are delighted to have him. We’ll give him to Gai Waterhouse to train.”

The price was to be expected for the Lomar Park-consigned son of Smart Company (Aus) according to Magnier. “When you have all of the judges on the same horse, you know you’re going to have to pay a premium,” he confirmed.

Waterhouse later said of Thursday’s Magic Millions topper, “He just glides over the ground, and the last horse I said was poetry in motion was last year’s three-time Group 1 winner Pierro (Aus) and he turned out a champion, and from this sale as well - let’s hope lot 251 turns out as good. There’s good speed in the family and I am delighted to be given him to train by Coolmore Stud.”

Lomar Park principal Fred Peisah has developed this colt’s female family since acquiring third dam Social Smile (GB) (Ennis). He did not put a reserve on lot 251.

“We had tremendous inquiry about him,” Peisah explained. “I just told the auctioneer, ‘Sell. Whenever you get your first bid, you’re on the market.’ After 47 years, you learn something about the industry, and if you’ve got the right sort of inquiry, you’re alright.”

www.magicmillions.com.au

Extract from Thoroughbred Daily News

FREELANCE FOR FRANKIE

Frankie Dettori
(Image : CNN)

“We haven’t seen the last of Senor Dettori”

When Godolphin’s star jockey, Frankie Dettori took the ride on the opposition Coolmore’s Camelot in the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe (Gr.1) a fortnight back, we thought we’d struck a new angle in predicting a rift between jockey and employer was unavoidable, and that the winds were “certainly a changin”. Yet someone out there even accused us of “sour grapes”, though what that had to do with the battle between Coolmore and Godolphin, we don’t know.

The truth is, you didn’t have to be a genius to know that this was something of a thumb on the nose from Dettorri to his erstwhile employers, and whatever the reasons, that’s how life is. Either way, nobody has a monopoly on anybody else’s money or services, and it seems we were on the money in suggesting that Frankie might be on his way. Just yesterday, the website of Sheikh Mohammed’s Godolphin operation read “Frankie Dettorri will not be retained by Godolphin next year”.

Dettori, whose 18-year spell in the royal blue began with the ride on the operation’s first Classic winner, Ballanchine in 1994, has registered 110 pattern race successes for the firm in total. According to Godolphin’s racing manager, Simon Crisford, “Frankie has made the difference between winning and losing on so many occasions in the world’s biggest races. However he is looking for a fresh challenge, and we felt that the retainer was not really working, so this is the best way forward.” If riding for the enemy in the Arc was not what was meant by “the retainer is not really working”, it’s anybody’s guess what it might mean.

And while Dettori may not always be counted upon to be the arch diplomat, he certainly played this one like he was blessed by the Vatican, “I’ve had 18 wonderful years. Godolphin has been a major part of what I’ve achieved in racing, and I’ve loved every minute of it. I feel the time has come for a change. My position in the stable has changed a little bit, and I need a new challenge. Sheikh Mohammed had the confidence to take me on board when I was young, and we smashed every record together”.

One thing you can count on: we haven’t seen the last of Senor Dettori.

COOLMORE vs DARLEY : THE WINDS OF CHANGE

“Rumblings within the Godolphin Camp”

The announcement this week that Frankie Dettori would be taking the mount on Camelot in Sunday’s renewal of Europe’s greatest horse race, the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe (Gr.1), was pretty matter-of-fact. Yet there is a strong underlying political message in it. You see, Frankie Dettori is one of the world’s top jockeys of all time, and for well over a decade, he has been the unrivalled favourite of his employer, His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Ruler of Dubai. His annual retainer was rumoured to be in the millions of dollars, and besides being rewarded for every ride and the commissions that accrue to jockeys on their prize money, he was showered with lavish presents for big race victories.

Some seven or eight years ago, Sheikh Mohammed’s Godolphin racing operation was pretty much at the summit of the sport’s most successful racing operations. Ironically, the Sheikh chose that time to declare war on their principal adversaries, Coolmore. Nobody really knows the reasons behind it, but it was suspected that the Sheikh felt the commercial traffic between the two operations was “one-way”. He was providing liberal patronage for the Coolmore stallions, and was spending vast sums on their progeny at sales venues around the world. Coolmore were seldom if ever seen to put their hands up in the auction ring for a Darley (Sheikh Mohammed’s breeding arm) sired yearling, and they never sent a mare to any of the Sheikh’s own stallions. Besides, Sheikh Mohammed had established a global showpiece in Dubai’s World Cup meeting at the end of March, boasting the world’s richest prize money, and there was scarcely a Coolmore horse in sight.

It has to be said though, that at the time Coolmore presided over the most formidable band of stallion material in Europe (if not the world), and that really was the reason behind the Sheikh’s regular dominance of the market for youngsters sired by these stallions. In simple terms, he wanted to be the best, and so he had to buy the best. At the same time, Coolmore were also his principal opposition at the races, and they too wanted to own the best, so that they not only competed with the Sheikh in the sales ring, (which meant that quite often they were pushing him to pay substantially more for stock in which they may sometimes have owned an interest as well), but they had the luxury (and indeed, satisfaction) of being able to sell him services in numbers to their stallions. They had obviously taken a commercial decision as far as the patronage of the Sheikh’s stallions was concerned, and felt they could do better by continuing to use their own, a point borne out by results at the races. And when it came to the World Cup, Coolmore considered the timing inopportune: by March, their horses were in need of rest after demanding  European campaigns.

For obvious reasons, lean times followed for the Godolphin operation in the wake of the declaration of war, and Coolmore have pretty much had the European racing scene to themselves since then, with the progeny of Sadler’s Wells, Galileo, Montjeu, Danehill, Giant’s Causeway and Danehill Dancer, and the associated Maktoum entities have pretty much been feeding on the left-overs.

In the midst of all this, Frankie Dettori remained staunchly “Sheikh Mohammed”, and those who follow the game closely will recall many an embrace, particularly in their heyday, between jockey and master following a big race victory.

In more recent times though, there have been rumblings within the Godolphin camp about Frankie’s position as the “chosen one”, and that of the new pretender to his throne, Mickael Barzalona, who has had the pick of the rides in recent seasons. That there is a rift developing, whatever they may say, is unavoidable, and in his appointment to ride Camelot, arguably the best middle distance three-year-old Europe has seen in some years, (perhaps decades), there are two messages. Coolmore have laid down a challenge by employing Sheikh Mohammed’s darlin’ and the winds are certainly a changin’.

UP THE IRISH

Mick Goss hosts the Chinese Horseracing Delegation,
Box 3A Racing and Peter Gibson (Racing South Africa)
(Photo : Summerhill Stud)

“A bit of a tough weekend for the Old Country”

The headline to this article could be misleading, so don’t show it to persons under the age of 18. That said, while the Irish economy may well be under the “kosh”, you can’t get the Irish spirit down. About a month ago, we penned a piece about a €40 billion export success which Irish Thoroughbred Marketing had engineered with the Chinese authorities. Whatever else may be wrong with the finances of that remarkable little country, they continue to dominate the thoroughbred world in a manner no other country has done in modern times. As mankind’s history has taught us so many times, it’s often down to the labours of a few, and that’s very much the case with Ireland, where John Magnier’s Coolmore group have led the charge.

Nonetheless, this little country of ours, at the southernmost tip of what the civilized world to the north of us likes to call the “darkest continent”, has a more impressive history in the broader commercial world. Professor Nick Binedell (who’ll be a keynote speaker in our School of Excellence on Wednesday 11^th July), head of the Gordon Institute of Business Studies (one of the top twenty business schools on the planet,) likes to remind us that South Africa has produced more great companies than any other country of its size. That says something for the courage, the sense of enterprise and the pioneering spirit of this nation.

You might say then, that it’s hardly surprising we were one of the first countries in the world (after Ireland) to receive an official government delegation of citizens from the People’s Republic of China, but that’s not only to do with enterprise. It must be seen in the broader context of the value of our membership of the BRICS group of countries, and the fact that, of the bigger thoroughbred producing countries of the world, we’re better placed politically than most. The Americans and the Chinese are competitors; the Europeans are sceptical about Chinese money, and while they might have to take it one day, they’ll do so with reluctance; the Australians have been battling the Chinese about access to their mineral resources, and the Japanese have been at war with China for several centuries. It makes sense then, for China to talk to us about horse matters, hence the first delegation’s visit last week.

They were at Summerhill on Sunday, and we couldn’t have had a better group to accompany them. The fellows from Box 3A, are the new hopes for racehorse ownership among young people in this province. These fellows bring the camaraderie and the fresh spirit to racing that our generation once knew. If you haven’t yet heard of them, go to Greyville - you’re bound to hear them.

We did say at the outset that the title to this piece could be misleading. The reason is, if you’re a rugby man, you were watching the Springboks flatten the English on Saturday, and the Baby Boks take Argentina apart (35-3) on Sunday evening (if you weren’t in the blackout zone on the outskirts of Mooi River.) Both teams are in sublime form (in patches,) and while the Springboks need to put together 80 minutes of the kind of football they played in the first half of Saturday’s test, the fact is they’ve got the Poms cold. It will take a miracle turn-around to change next week’s outcome. Before we get too cocky though, remember the old bugbear, complacency.

And back to the Irish. Their junior team also gave England a good slap Sunday evening, so it was a bit of a tough weekend for the “Old Country”.

MUSIR TO STAND AT COOLMORE AUSTRALIA

Click above to watch Andrew Bon interviewing Mike de Kock on Musir…
(Image and Footage : Tellytrack)

MUSIR
Redoute’s Choice (AUS) - Dizzy De Lago (AUS)

The stallion roster at Coolmore Australia will be boosted in 2012 by the addition South African champion and leading international performer Musir.

A stud fee will be announced at a later date for the six-time group stakes winner, who is the highest rated son of Redoute’s Choice to date, according to Timeform, which described him as “a well-made horse and a high-class performer with a good turn of foot.”

As a two-year-old, the Mike de Kock-trained colt stamped himself a top-level performer when romping to a 3½-length score in the 2009 Golden Horseshoe (Grade 1), South Africa’s premier contest for juveniles, at 1400 meters (6.96 furlongs). That dominant win saw him crowned champion two-year-old of South Africa and earned him a trip to the prestigious Dubai International Racing Carnival.

It was in Dubai as a three-year-old that Musir announced himself an international star, running up a hat trick of impressive wins that included the 2010 UAE Derby (Grade 2) and the UAE 2000 Guineas (Grade 3). He went on to claim wins in the 2011 International Topkapi Trophy (Grade 2) and 2012 Al Rashidiya (Grade 2).

Overall, Musir has eight wins from 16 career starts and earnings of $2,457,481. He has finished off the board only twice.

Musir was produced by stakes-placed winner Dizzy De Lago, by Encosta de Lago, and is from the family of Japanese champion, classic winner, and leading sire King Kamehameha as well as Grade 1 winner and sire The Deputy (Ire).

Extract from Thoroughbred Times