Freedom Of Speech finds friends in high places at Champions Sale

The Leopardstown winners' enclosure, resplendent in vibrant florals, was the venue for the Goffs Champions Sale on Saturday as the prelude to Irish Champions Weekend.

Racegoers who got up early to arrive at Leopardstown in plenty of time for the main event, or perhaps hadn't gone to bed after Garth Brooks in Croke Park on Friday night, were treated to a little of the theatre of auctioneering.

While the fireworks in the sales ring could not match the pyrotechnic show from the King of Country across the city, there was still enough drama to whet the appetite ahead of Irish Flat racing's extravaganza.

Jim Bolger, whose extraordinary record as an owner, breeder and trainer is unparalleled, sent two home-bred three-year-olds to Leopardstown for sale and just one returned back to his stable in Coolcullen.

His three-year-old Australia filly Freedom Of Speech was the most interesting of the quartet entered in the boutique sale. Successful in a six furlong maiden at Naas last year and placed over five and six furlongs during her juvenile career, she brought coveted black type to the ring.

Freedom Of Speech added that to her catalogue page during her seasonal reappearance in which she finished third to Group 1 winner Mother Earth in the Group 3 Park Express Stakes at the Curragh. She was sold with an entry in the Group 3 Denny Cordell Lavarack and Lanwades Studs Fillies Stakes at Gowran next Saturday, and Bobby O'Ryan, who purchased the filly on behalf of a new client, indicated Freedom Of Speech could take up that engagement.

"She stays in training in Ireland," O'Ryan confirmed after signing for the filly at €140,000. "She is a lovely filly who already has her black type and has the potential to earn more. With that and her pedigree, she has residual value as a broodmare."

The pedigree O'Ryan refers to is one that Bolger bought into back in 2006 with the purchase of her second dam, Six Nations, from Darley for €52,000 at the 2006 Goffs November Breeding Stock Sale.

A daughter of Danzig who won at four in France, she is a full-sister to prolific Grade 1 winner and US champion two-year-old and sire Chief's Crown.

Jim Bolger was in attendance at the Champions Sale to see two horses he was offeringCredit: Patrick McCann (racingpost.com/photos)

Six Nations is also a half-sister to the Grade 1 Gazelle Stakes and Frizette Stakes winner Classic Crown, who became a successful broodmare in Japan where her descendants include Group 3 winner and sire A Shin G Line and Group 2 winner Reach The Crown, who also earned a berth at stud.

From her line, Bolger has bred the Group 3 Eyrefield Stakes winner and Group 3 Ballysax Stakes second Flying Visit from the first Northern Hemisphere crop of Pride Of Dubai.

Freedom Of Speech is out of the winning Vocalised mare Vocal Nation, who has a perfect record with three winners from three runners so far and with a yearling filly and foal by Bolger's homebred 2000 Guineas winner Dawn Approach.

Following the sale, Goffs group chief executive Henry Beeby said:
"The Goffs Champions Sale is part of our programme of boutique sales and, as such, it provides potential just before one of the great days of Irish racing whilst also adding a bit of theatre to the
overall pre-race entertainment on track."

Beeby was characteristically forthright about the sale's clearance rate, as Freedom of Speech was the only one of the four horses offered to meet their reserve.

"Obviously we would have preferred to sell more of the catalogue but we believe that the concept has a future and wish the new connections of Freedom Of Speech the very best of luck."

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