The Thoroughbred Breeders’ Association is pleased with the select offering of some of the best bred yearlings in the country at the 2012 Emperors Palace National Yearling Sale.
From an entry of nearly 700, top blue blooded yearlings will be invited into next year’s catalogue. The 2012 National Yearling Sale, to be held at the TBA’s complex in Germiston, will run from April 27 to April 29 next year.
The yearlings will be handpicked by two of South Africa’s foremost judges in yearlings, John Kramer and Stanley Bennett.
The National Sale has a remarkable history of producing some of the country’s finest racehorses, many of whom go onto international glory.
The two top priced colts at the 2010 Emperors Palace National Yearling Sale are two of the finest 3yos around. Potala Palace, who fetched R4 million at the sale, won the G1 Premier’s Champion Juvenile Stakes, and is a leading contender for the G2 Dingaans on Summer Cup day at the end of the month.
Second top lot at the 2010 sale was Divine Jet, who went for R3.6 million. The brilliant colt is unbeaten in two starts, and is considered one of the top 3yos racing in the Western Cape at the moment.
Another graduate to have made headlines at the 2010 National Yearling Sale was Fifth Dan. Purchased for R600 000, Fifth Dan was subsequently exported to Singapore, where from just a handful of starts, he is a winner and been placed four times.
The best filly to have come off the 2010 Emperors Palace National Yearling Sale was Princess Victoria. Named an Equus Champion at two, Princess Victoria, who cost R325 000, is a red hot favourite to win the G1 Avontuur Estate Cape Fillies Guineas next month.
Just a year earlier, the Emperors Palace National Yearling Sale sold such luminaries as the champion filly Ebony Flyer, Dubai classic colt Zanzamar, G2 Emerald Cup winner The Mouseketeer and G1 winners Chocolicious and Emerald Cove.
There have been 63 individual G1 winners bred in this country in the years 2004 to 2008. The years 2009 and 2010 involve horses still to young to have fully completed statistics. Of these 63 top level winners, no fewer than 39 were bought at the National Yearling Sale. This means that a staggering 61% of G1 winners bred during the period of 2004 and 2008 came off the National Sale.
It is remarkable to think that over a period of four years, nearly two thirds of the country’s top horses all come off one sale and The Thoroughbred Breeders’ Association believe that this sale will certainly remain the top venue for classic thoroughbreds that have proven themselves all over the world.
