31 Jan 2023A top-quality daughter of champion sire Written Tycoon was expected to be one of our leading lights during the closing session of New Zealand Bloodstock’s Book 1 Sale and so it proved with a terrific result.
Our filly sold right up to her looks and deep pedigree when she was knocked down to the final bid of $460,000 from trainer Andrew Forsman with bloodstock agents Andrew Williams and Bevan Smith.
“She is a filly we have been waiting for, we had to wait until day three, which was a little agonising in itself,” Williams said.
“We are very happy to get her. We went over budget by $10,000 in order to get her, but hopefully that is a good decision in the long-term.
“We are excited to get her and she is going to get every chance with Andrew Forsman and hopefully we see her in the Melbourne spring as a three-year-old filly.
“We need to buy quality in order to compete in Melbourne. We have got to take fillies like this and put them through Andrew’s system and let’s hope they are good enough to be running in Melbourne in the spring.”
Williams is also hoping to snare more immediate riches in New Zealand with next year’s Karaka Million 2YO on the radar.
“We will point her in that direction and see if we can get her there. You need to have a lot of luck to get a runner pre-Christmas, everything needs to go right,” he said.
“We thought she was forward enough physically, her demeanor and everything about her was faultless.”
She is a daughter of Save The Date and the Savabeel mare won on four occasions up to 1400 metres and a family that features Starcraft, an elite level winner in New Zealand Australia, England and France.
We have always loved Spirit Of Boom and his son, Lot 518, repaid us handsomely when he sold to Jamie Walters’ Proven Thoroughbreds for $330,000.
The colt is the first foal of the More Than Ready mare Sienna Rose who is a half-sister to the stakes winner Ebhaar.
The second dam is a half-sister to the top-class sprinter Merchant Navy, a Group 1 winner in Australia and England, and the G2 Roman Consul Stakes winner and G1 Coolmore Stud Stakes runner-up Jolie Bay.
We had high expectations of our son of So You Think and Lot 464 didn’t let us down with a number of buyers chasing him.
The colt was popular in the lead-up and that theme continued when he entered the ring with Mornington trainer Shane Nichols not to be denied and he closed out bidding at $275,000.
“I just loved him and he’s a very athletic horse with a progressive pedigree,” he said.
“He’s been reared on a quality stud that can produce superstars.”
The youngster is out of the Power mare Respin who was successful in the Listed Inglewood Stakes and her first foal is Balance Of Power, a son of Almanzor who finished runner-up in the Listed Challenge Stakes.
“I was really happy to get him and he’ll go back to Australia and have a bit of time off before we break him in and get him into the system,” Nichols said.
Young resident stallion Embellish also made a splash on the final day of Book 1 when Lot 561 was landed by Hong Kong trainer Jamie Richards for $175,000.
The colt is a son of the Fastnet Rock mare Stylish Achiever and the next two dams, Flying Object and Will Fly, were Group 3 winners.
Embellish only had two representatives in Book 1 and the other was sold by us to Te Akau for $80,000 with Lot 152 also out of a Fastnet Rock mare in Elegant Achiever and a family littered with international Group 1 winners.