“Let me get this right. You bought an unraced horse … in a tent … for four and a half million. You are a looney”.
Vintage Monty Python at the Lanzerac Sale, where unraced 2yo Brutal Force set a new South African yearling/2yo auction record.
Of course it wasn’t as looney as it appears at first glance.
Ready To Run sales nowadays….
are linked to very rich races, so the trick is to qualify a horse by sending it through the ring. That includes the scenario where you’d bought the horse at another sale, offer it again, and simply buy it back. That was the case with Brutal Force, full brother to Red Ray who was short priced favourite for the 2013 Ready to Run race a day after this sale.
Brutal Force had been acquired from Lammerskraal Stud early in 2013 at the Book One sale, for R1.5 million. So the opening bid of R1 million seemed to indicate the vendor’s intentions: scare them off and buy him back. That didn’t prove as easy as may have been expected – there was opposition!
It became a battle which required steely nerves. How far should you go when buying back? At what stage will you give in and take the profit? How crazy will the opposition be?
In the end, Red Ray’s trainer Joey Ramsden made the final bid of R4.5 million, and Brutal Force remained where he’d come from.
It was great entertainment.
Four other 2yo’s also broke the R1 million barrier. Highlands got R1.7 million for a Judpot half brother to Gr1 winner Divine Jury. The colt had been a Book One entry earlier in 2013, but was withdrawn from the sale. Not so the Seventh Rock colt out of Gr1 placed Valeta (a daughter of Gr1 Sarabande), who had been a R425k Book One purchase for bloodstock agent Peter Doyle & partners, when offered by Avontuur Farm. He found a new home with Adriaan van Vuuren and Mike Azzie, who had to bid R1.4 million to secure the 2yo.
Then there was the colt by Western Winter (also the sire of brothers Brutal Force and Red Ray), out of a non-winning daughter of SA Oaks winner Lambarina. He’d been bought at the National Sale for R160k, Altus Joubert the vendor. It took R1.2 million this time, to get him qualified for the big sale race.
Highest priced filly, at R1 million, was the full sister to champion Mother Russia. She’d been retained by her breeder, Normandy Stud’s Veronica Foulkes, at the Book One sale, getting to R500k in that ring – a decision which paid off nicely here.
The overall sale average went from R170k at last year’s inaugural event to R209k. The median prices remained exactly the same; R100k overall, with R120k for colts and R80k for fillies.
Interesting to note the result of the R2 million Lanzerac Ready To Run race at Kenilworth, contested a day after the sale. Winner Captain America had been a R400k National Sale purchase, re-sold for R500k at the Ready to Run sale 8 months later. Runner-up Red Ray came from the Book One sale, bought for R700k, and realised R800k when bought back at the Ready To Run sale. Both horses look to be topclass, and should make their presence felt in the Cape Guineas next month.
