July Sales Update
It’s been a busy couple of weeks for us in the sales ring and we’re delighted to have added three new horses to the team.
The Arquana Summer Sale in France has been a fine source of future winners for David O’Meara in the past, with star names such as Mondialiste and Lord Glitters sourced at the Deauville sales complex. Dave’s assistant and bloodstock agent Jason Kelly signed for eight horses during the course of the sale, including TIGER TOUCH on our behalf.
On a shortlist of two horses we’d highlighted as being of interest going into the sale, Dave and Jason were impressed by the physique of Tiger Touch upon seeing him in the flesh so we pressed on to purchase him for what we felt was a real value price of E32,000. A son of the US Triple Crown and Breeders’ Cup Classic winner American Pharoah out of the Group-winning mare Osaila, he has an excellent pedigree and form in some strong races in France. We believe he can be better placed in the UK and hope to have him running by the middle of August, potentially as part of a team in The Racing League which launches later this month and offers 50k total prize funds for each race on a card.
Shares were immediately offered to current shareholders in our other horses and all available shares were quickly snapped up.
Onto Newmarket’s Tattersalls July Sale and we’d hoped to add a nice filly to our squad on Wednesday but unfortunately Karuoka proved out of our range, eventually being knocked down to Eve Johnson Houghton for 77,000 Guineas. A gorgeous daughter of Dubawi with some strong form, she’s one to keep an eye on for her new connections.
One or two others of interest were removed from the list following physical inspection and vetting so we didn’t end up purchasing on the opening day of the sale but we did say goodbye to our three-time winner WARRIOR BRAVE. As a 100 rated 3yo there’s a chance a horse like Warrior Brave can make a significant sum but plenty of things need to come together to get the top money and that wasn’t quite the case this time. Still, at 100,000 Guineas he was one of the most expensive geldings sold last week and leaves behind some great memories and a healthy profit. Purchased to go into training with Ross O’Sullivan in Ireland, we wish his new connections every success and would love to see Warrior in the winners enclosure soon. For all we don’t see there being tons of improvement in Warrior Brave, he’s a very sound and straightforward horse and with the sprint handicap division in Ireland not being quite as competitive as it is in the UK we’re hoping he’ll prove a great buy for his new owners.
Onto Thursday and, as expected, it proved to be fairly uneventful for us. The few horses we had considered were either withdrawn or scratched from our list after physical inspection and vetting.
We’d always anticipated the final day of the sale would be our busiest so it wasn’t a surprise that we were able to add a couple of new names to our team during the morning session. Former Shadwell horses such as Hakam, Mithqaal, Saaheq and Kasbaan have been a huge success in our colours in the past and after highlighting a few of the latest Shadwell draft as of serious interest we were delighted to secure a couple our top targets for the week with lot 621 HATHLOOL and lot 703 SAATTY both secured for 22,000 Guineas.
Both acquisitions from Newmarket will be trained by Mick Appleby and with Hathlool already sold out, there are only shares available in Saatty, details of which are below.
SAATTY
Bought out of the Kevin Prendergast yard from Shadwell, Saatty is a Markaz gelding who has run 6 times between mid-March & mid-June this year. After catching the eye with a strong-travelling 4th of 20 on his debut at the Curragh it would be fair to say that Saatty hasn't really progressed, although his 4th at Gowran in May was another good effort (recording a Timeform timefigure of 79) & some other subsequent runs have had excuses in our opinion.
A compact, sprinting type in appearance, Saatty tried 5f only once but had more than enough speed for the trip & with a lot of speed influences in his pedigree we do feel that he's worth giving more opportunities to over shorter distances, whilst a lot of his family have been very effective on all-weather surfaces (including the sire Markaz who put up his career-best effort on his sole AW start in the Chipchase Stakes) so the AW is another angle to explore with him for all that he has clearly shown ability/promise on turf.
Mick was particularly keen on this horse as a type & he’s essentially fit & ready to go so the hope will be to have Saatty running in our colours at some point in August, with a possible race already identified for him over 5f at Chelmsford on August 15th. Saatty will also be added to The Racing League team making those 50k handicaps a possible option for him next month.
The cost of a 10% share in Saatty is £3,200 to cover purchase price, sales commissions & vetting, management fee, travel from the sales, fees for July & syndicate registration.
Monthly payments begin on August 1 at £260 pcm.