December Mares Sale: ‘A Jewel Can Be Found Anywhere’

[Wandering Eyes]

The Tattersalls December Sale is played out, akin to panto season, over two weeks, matinees and evening performances, incorporating almost every facet of the bloodstock sales business, from foals to yearlings, horses in training, broodmares, and sometimes the odd stallion or two.

The Sceptre Sessions are only in their third year but they are already embedded as an integral part of the annual finale at Park Paddocks. And there is little doubt that the theatrical highlights come on the Monday and Tuesday of the second week, as dusk settles in and and the ring fills up.

Few who were there will forget Dancing Rain (Ire) going through that ring carrying would would become one of the first-crop foals of Frankel (GB). Then there was Marsha (Ire), a six-million-guinea showstopper who rendered even her loquacious trainer Sir Mark Prescott speechless for a moment or two.

In Dancing Rain's year, Immortal Verse (Ire) topped the sale at 4,700,000gns. An eye-watering price for many, but in hindsight, and in the fevered tier that is the top end of the bloodstock market, one could almost call that money well spent. Her offspring now include the dual Group 1 winner Tenebrism (Caravaggio), Group 2 winner Statuette (Justify) and, most recently, the GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf winner Henri Matisse (Ire) (Wootton Bassett {GB}).

“That was a great December Mares Sale day,” says Jimmy George, hijacking Breeders' Cup Friday as only a marketing man could but, as it turns out, with some justification. 

“Henri Matisse is out of Immortal Verse, [Juvenile Turf Fillies winner] Lake Victoria is out of Quiet Reflection, who made 2,100,000gns, and [Juvenile Turf Sprint winner] Magnum Force is out of a mare that cost 38,000gns.

“So that's the December Sale encapsulated. With sales like this, you want people to feel confident at all levels of the market. And when you are shelling out huge sums of money, like 4,700,000 on Immortal Verse, well, Coolmore have now got a stallion.”

He adds, “Then last year there was the extraordinary Via Sistina, turning 2,700,000gns into about £3,500,000 in prize-money, within a year, and she's still going.”

The example of Via Sistina (Ire) (Fastnet Rock {Aus}) is all the more remarkable given that she first appeared at the December Sale in the yearling section, when she was sold for 5,000gns to Stephen and Rebecca Hillen, in whose colours she later won the G1 Pretty Polly Stakes at the Curragh. The race was sponsored by Yulong, who five months later owned the winner.

If you'd like a quick historical reminder of how the elite sale within a sale got its name, here's an account of the life of the great racemare Sceptre from TDN two years ago. Looking ahead to this year's Sceptre Sessions, it is easy to imagine a few more footnotes in the 258-year history of Tattersalls will be written.

While Goffs had Gouache (Ger) (Shamardal), the dam of Goliath (Ger) (Adlerflug {Ger}), the mother of another of this year's Japan Cup runners, Fantastic Moon (Ger), is catalogued at Tattersalls. Frangipani (Ger) (Jukebox Jury {Ire}) is being offered by The Castlebridge Consignment as lot 1747 on behalf of her breeders Philip and Marion Stauffenberg and the 10-year-old mare is again carrying to Fantastic Moon's sire Sea The Moon (Ger).

The 2023 German Classics were kind to Sea The Moon. As well as the Fantastic Moon's Deutsches Derby win, he was also responsible for the G1 Preis der Diana winner Muskoka (Ger), and her dam Morning Mist (Ger) (Peintre Celebre), who is from the family of one of the modern-day German greats in Monsun (Ger), is also in the Sceptre Sessions as lot 1464 from Ronald Rauscher. She is carrying to Sea The Moon once more. 

Remaining on the German theme for one moment, there is the chance, also within the Rauscher draft, to buy a full-sister to the 2021 Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe winner Torquator Tasso (Ger) (Adlerflug {Ger}) in the form of Tiara Hilleshage (Ger). The four-year-old filly has not one but two Group 1-winning brothers, including Tunnes (Ger) (Guiliani {Ger}), and she is herself a winner, in the colours of her Dutch breeder Paul H Vandeburg.

From The Track To The Ring

Some of this year's star performers on the track will doubtless produce notable performances of a different kind at Park Paddocks next week. The Irish Oaks winner You Got To Me (GB) (Nathaniel {Ire}) is still very much a racing prospect and is naturally a major draw in that prime Tuesday slot, selling as lot 1753, just one lot after the G2 Duke Of Cambridge Stakes winner Rogue Millennium (GB) (Dubawi {Ire}) for what will be her third appearance in this sale in just four years. As an unraced two-year-old she was a good buy by Billy Jackson-Stops at 35,000gns. Last year she fetched 1,650,000gns when sold from Tom Clover's stable. 

The four-year-old Believing (Ire) (Mehmas {Ire}), offered as lot 1740 from Highclere Stud, has had a busy and fruitful year highlighted by her win in the G2 Sapphire Stakes. She was also twice runner-up to Bradsell (GB) – in the G1 Nunthorpe and G1 Flying Five.

 

You Got To Me wins the Irish Oaks | Racingfotos

 

“I think it caught the imagination from the word go, some innovations do, some don't. But this one very definitely has,”says George of the Sceptre Sessions.

“I think it's slightly aspirational as well, for people who've got smart fillies and mares. And the buyers, as well, recognise it as a hallmark of quality – these are elite fillies and mares. It doesn't mean there aren't elite fillies and mares throughout the catalogue, because of course there are others. And we've always got these very smart consignments from Godolphin, Juddmonte and Shadwell, that are mini annual dispersals of some very smart stock. So it's not just about the Sceptre Sessions, but they are a focal point.”

Alex Elliott manages to juggle various responsibilities come sales time, and as well as being a busy agent he also set up his own consigning business, Imperium Sales, several years ago. He has his most important client to date among the owners of the horses in this year's draft as lot 1733, Azure Blue (Ire) (El Kabeir), whose eight wins include the G2 Duke of York Stakes, is owned by his mother, Anne, in partnership with Peter Appleton. 

Another notable 'blue' is Mehmas's daughter and Classic prospect Vertical Blue (Ire), the winner of the G1 Prix Marcel Boussac, who is making her way over from Francis Graffard's Chantilly stable to come under the hammer in Newmarket as lot 1770.

George's tenure at Tattersalls, which stretches back to 1986 with a brief three-year hiatus in the early days, will soon be coming to an end, so he speaks with experience when he notes significant purchases from the lower end of the price spectrum. 

He says, “There's quality throughout the December Sale. And as we all know, a jewel can be found anywhere. Looking back, I think it was my first year here, 1986, the lowest-priced filly or mare of the Jim Joel Dispersal turned out to be the most influential. [Regal Beauty] became the dam of High Estate and King's Theatre, and Michael Poland bought her for 5,200 guineas.”

George continues, “Then there was Senta's Dream, the dam of Order Of Australia, Iridessa and Santa Barbara. She was bought on the last day of the December Sale, back in 2013, for 14,000gns. 

“You never know where your life-changing filly or mare is going to spring from and I think that's the hallmark of the December Sales, and it's what brings so many people from so many different parts of the world every year. Certain people will have their own pet families, their own favourites, and it might not be that obvious on the catalogue page.”

Another last-day purchase in 2023 was the Cape Cross (Ire) mare Zurigha (Ire), herself a listed winner and a half-sister to Group 3 winner Lily's Angel (Ire) (Dark Angel {Ire}) from the high-flying family of Bellarida (Fr) (Bellypha {Fr}). At 25,000gns she was the fourth-top lot of that final session and, though she had been covered by Too Darn Hot (GB) she was not in foal when sold. In the interim, however, her Too Darn Hot three-year-old Oversubscribed (GB) – a 400,000gns Book 1 purchase by Mike Ryan for Klaravich Stables – has won the listed Wild Applause Stakes at Aqueduct and was recently runner-up in the G3 Pebbles Stakes. Unsurprisingly, Zurigha, now in foal again to the young Darley sire, returns to Park Paddocks next week as lot 1687 with Barton Sales. Blue Chip Bloodstock, her purchaser last year, looks set to make a nice profit. 

International Outlook, Inward Investment 

Along with the buyers attending Tattersalls with a view to exporting mares around the world, the new wave of high-spending owners to have based their racing interests in the UK and Ireland will doubtless start to be felt at the mares sales as well as in the yearling and breeze-up sector. 

Emerging international operations such as Amo, Wathnan, Victorious and KHK Racing, all have or will have stallions to support, even if they are not standing under their own banner – think King Of Steel, Bucanero Fuerte (Fr) Persian Force (Ire) at Tally-Ho Stud, Isaac Shelby (GB) at Newsells Park Stud, Vandeek (GB) at Cheveley Park Stud, and Bradsell (GB) at the National Stud. Amo's Kia Joorabchian was explicit in his intentions when buying well-bred individuals during Book 1, stating that he and his partners have their hearts set on competing consistently at the top level. That is likely to include the purchase of some established broodmares or well-credentialed race fillies too.

“It's hugely important and demonstrates that enduring appeal, and a diverse appeal,” George says. “Apart from anything else, it's bringing overseas investment into Britain, something that might be lost on the current government, given their stance on all things agricultural, but might be something that should be drawn to their attention. That inward investment in the rural community and rural-based industries is massively important, and it is encouraging to see.”

He continues, “There's no shortage of quality in the catalogue. You've got an Irish Oaks winner in the shape of You Got To Me, you've got the highest rated two-year-old in France, in the shape of Vertical Blue, and the likes of Believing, and Idea Generation and Rogue Millennium, and the dam of Kalpana as well, Zero Gravity. And of course there's a handful of very well-bred mares, in foal to Southern Hemisphere time, all of them to Too Darn Hot.”

George adds, “We have a Tattersalls Online Sale in association with Inglis Online, where we'll be featuring mares bred to Southern Hemisphere time as well, taking place in the middle of December. This is a part of the market that's growing, and the online platforms make that easier to do.”

 

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