'She's a good Flemensfirth' - Sunnyhill Stud filly tops July session at €50,000

It was all about the girls at Tattersalls Ireland yesterday, when fillies dominated the upper echelons of the market during the company’s inaugural July Store Sale.

The expanded opportunities on the track for fillies has served to enhance their appeal to the market and that, combined with some choice pedigrees, ensured that four of the top five lots were fillies.

The Flynn family from Dungarvan has enjoyed notable success with a daughter of Flemensfirth, the homebred Colreevy, whose nine victories include three Grade 1 triumphs against geldings.

With their star now destined for a career as a broodmare the Waterford hoteliers were in the market for another racing and breeding prospect and alighted upon Sunnyhill Stud’s daughter of Flemensfirth, who is a sister to the Listed-placed Good Boy Bobby.

She is out of Princess Gaia, a King’s Theatre sister to Voler La Vedette, whose own Grade 1 triumph in the Hatton’s Grace Hurdle was achieved across the road from the sales complex.

Michael Tobin, acting for the new owners, who parted with €50,000 to secure her, explained: "She’s a lovely model with a good mind, she’s a good Flemensfirth. The pedigree speaks for itself and the first dam is still breeding so there’s more to come, hopefully. A trainer hasn’t yet been decided."

Her broodmare potential is enhanced by her dam’s Exit To Nowhere half-sister Labyrinth, who has produced the brilliant Shishkin, winner of Grade 1 novice contests at the past two Cheltenham Festivals.

Another bought with longer-term prospects in mind was the daughter of leading sire and broodmare sire Saint Des Saints with an impressive family, who went the way of Matt Coleman for €45,000.

Offered by Springhill Stud, she is the first foal of Milanteea, an unraced Milan half-sister to Identity Thief, winner of the Fighting Fifth Hurdle and Stayers Hurdle at Aintree - both Grade 1s - by another son of Sadler’s Wells in Kayf Tara. Her second dam Miss Artea is by Flemensfirth and from the further family of that stallion’s 2019 RSA Chase winner Topofthegame.

"She’s for Semore Kurdi [Newcastle Falcons chairman], who was keen to buy a Saint Des Saints filly to race and then breed from," said Coleman. “She’s a great moving, racy filly with a lovely pedigree. Saint Des Saints is a great sire and is turning into a phenomenal broodmare sire too.”

The Saints Des Saints filly out of Milanteea takes her turn in the ringCredit: Tattersalls Ireland/Pat Healy

Haras d’Etreham’s 23-year-old son of Cadoudal is the sire of 13 individual Grade 1 winners and the broodmare sire of such luminaries as Cheltenham Grade 1 winners Appreciate It, Douvan and Envoi Allen.

Coleman also bought Ballincurrig House Stud’s Soldier Of Fortune filly for €21,000, this one on behalf of Noel Williams. She is out of Shantou Rose who, as her name suggests, is by Shantou and is a half-sister to the Grade 1 Sefton Novices’ Hurdle third Cannington Brook.

Fillies from the first Boardsmill Stud-bred crop of the late Mount Nelson were also popular with buyers and rounded out the top five.

First of the pair to make a splash was Sean Murphy’s filly out of Tatispout, a winning daughter of another Boardsmill sire, Califet. Offered by The Paddocks and from the family of Cheltenham and Aintree festival winner Oiseau De Nuit, she elicited a winning bid of €32,000 from British-based jump jockey and agent Jerry McGrath.

"She’s going to England and into training, though no plans have been made yet," said McGrath. "She’s cracking filly and for me was a close second to the Flemensfirth sold earlier today. She’s very athletic and has a good step."

Rathturtin Stud’s Mount Nelson filly, meanwhile, will be going down the point-to-point route after her purchase by Denis Murphy’s Ballyboy Stables for €31,000. She is out of the Flemensfirth mare Apple Trix, whose first foal, the Stowaway gelding Fawsley Spirit, won last season for Ben Pauling.

Top-priced gelding

Boardsmill also played the role of successful consignors as well as stallion farm on Wednesday, offering the highest-priced gelding during the day’s trade, and the only horse catalogued by the late Haras de la Baie stallion Crillon, most notable on these shores as the sire of JP McManus’s dual Champion Hurdle hero Buveur D’Air.

He is out of the Poliglote mare Passion Du Berlais, the dam of two winners from three runners so far. She is a daughter of Grade 3 Prix General de Saint Didier Hurdle winner Psychee Du Berlais, who was twice placed in Grade 1 contests at Auteuil and is a Saint Preuil sister to Arthur Moore’s Marcus Du Berlais, winner of Leopardstown’s Pierce Handicap Chase and third to Numbersixvalverde in the Irish Grand National.

I Will Be Baie proved the top-selling geldingCredit: Tattersalls Ireland/Pat Healy

He was returning a quick profit on his €25,000 purchase price in France last autumn. Colin Bowe signed for the gelding, already named I Will Be Baie, at €43,000 and is hoping to have similar success with him as he has tasted with previous purchases by Crillon.

I have had a couple by the sire and they have been very lucky for me," said Bowe. "They are not making Crillons anymore, so let's hope this lad goes on okay."

Bowe landed a touch with his most recent Crillon purchase prior to Wednesday, Au Fleuron, who was bought with Denis Murphy last summer for £37,000. He made a winning debut in a point-to-point bumper at Tipperary in March before selling for £220,000 to Noel and Valerie Moran’s Bective Stud at Tattersalls' Cheltenham March Sale.

Facts and figures

This sale, which was delayed by a month, had six horses sell for at least €30,000, with 16 making a minimum of €20,000. Wednesday’s aggregate was €1,491,900 for 143 sold, the clearance rate coming in at 68 per cent.

Tattersalls Ireland’s first July Store Sale returned an average price of €10,433, with the median at €8,000.

A three-day run of selling concludes on Thursday with the August National Hunt Sale, from 10am.

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