'It can make you or break you' - John Gosden lifts the lid on sales season

Hours of pedigree study, racking up the miles inspecting stock and stretching your budget to breaking point; you need to be prepared for all three when on the hunt for future talent at public auction according to John Gosden.

The champion trainer brought the significance of sales season into sharp relief when speaking at Tattersalls on Tuesday, saying: "It's a very important time; the truth is it can make you or break you over the next two years.

"If you get the wrong yearlings or buy the ones who don't work out, it can be instrumental on the whole success of your stable."

Gosden was speaking during the launch of the Newmarket Gold Season, a concept that officially links the two weeks of the Tattersalls October Yearling Sale and the Rowley Mile's autumn racing programme, which includes five Group 1 contests.

John Gosden eyes up a yearling on parade at TattersallsCredit: Edward Whitaker

He continued: "It's a tough time of year because you're trying to train horses early in the morning and then you've got to come and look at all these yearlings. In Book 1 you have to look at them all given the pedigrees that are there.

"It's not like the old days, now we're up and down that hill looking at yearlings two or three times, there's a lot of due diligence that goes into it. Everyone up here [at Tattersalls] works extraordinarily hard.

"The idea that they all come up here and have long lunches is long gone," he added with a broad grin, before expanding on the processes behind finding untapped talent among catalogues of mammoth proportions.

"You're looking at everything, starting with the pedigree right through to the provenance; what farm the horse comes from and its upbringing, the family, then the make-up of the horse itself – it's a lot of hard work. Then when you think you've found the one, you don't even get a bid in, you're completely blown out! That's heart-breaking."

As well as signing for yearlings under his own name, including the likes of Palace Pier, who maintained an unblemished record with a second scintillating display at Sandown on Wednesday, Gosden has also been a central figure in Godolphin's buying team in recent years.

John Gosden with Sheikh Mohammed during Book 1 of the Tattersalls October Yearling SaleCredit: Edward Whitaker

Just last week he was by Sheikh Mohammed's side when the ruler of Dubai's operation secured ten yearlings for a total outlay of $16 million at the Keeneland September Sale, a haul headed by the $4.1m Curlin colt out of Bounding.

"It's very, very competitive at any part of the market," he said. "If you go there with a budget it's very tough to stick to it, that doesn't matter whether you have 20,000 or 400,000. When you're trying to buy a horse to fit your budget, you'll go in there and find that suddenly the whole gate fills up behind you – 'oh no, they're all on it!' – but that's just the way it is."

He continued: "You try to find value but it's increasingly difficult, these sales have been very strong. In America the market was incredibly strong, but of course they run for a whole lot more money. They won't sell their horse unless they think they're getting the money, because they can get their horse to the races and run in a $100,000 maiden. That's a little bit different to us."

Gosden added that his stable is split roughly 55 per cent to 45 per cent in favour of homebreds supplied by owner-breeders such as Anthony Oppenheimer, Lady Bamford, Meon Valley Stud and Prince Khalid Abdullah, founder of the Juddmonte empire.

Logician: the St Leger winner was trained by John Gosden for owner-breeder Prince Khalid AbdullahCredit: Edward Whitaker

Among the homebred stars to have graduated from the Clarehaven Stables academy are Anapurna, Calyx, Logician and Too Darn Hot, all of whom are by sires who reside in Newmarket. Their trainer went on to emphasise the impact the town's burgeoning stallion ranks have had on the area.

"What has changed greatly since I was first in Newmarket in 1974 with Noel Murless is the quality of stallions, that's what's become the magnet," he said. "When you had a Classic winner in the 70s and 80s they went straight to Kentucky. We were attending the Keeneland July Sale and it was a European sale held in the middle of the bluegrass of Kentucky.

"That changed, led by Coolmore and all of the studs here, places like Cheveley Park and Dalham Hall. Then the Middle East investment came, and when they had a good horse they made sure it stayed here.

"Consequently, having been in Keeneland last week, I promise you less than two per cent of the catalogue is relevant to racing in Europe now; it's dirt stallions and dirt racing.

"That's why people are coming [to Newmarket] from places like Australasia and Japan. This is where the best turf horses are and the best stallions, and those stallions bring the best mares."

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