Lowly store-turned £170,000 Goffs UK graduate looks the business at Newbury

Gritty Newbury bumper winner Lookaway repaid connections' faith in kind after the £170,000 Goffs UK December Point-to-Point sale graduate proved too strong in the concluding race on Sunday.

Sent off the 5-2 favourite for Neil King and owner Peter Beadles, the five-year-old showed a good attitude in the soft ground and stormy weather at Newbury, digging deep under Jack Quinlan to get the better of Fame And Concrete by a length and three-quarters in the ten-strong field.

A son of Willow Wood Farm resident Ask, Lookaway was bred by William Neville and sold for just €6,500 at the delayed 2020 Tattersalls Ireland May Store Sale to Sean Doyle.

It is safe to say that investment came up trumps around 18 months later when Lookaway was one of the standout lots at the Yorton Farm auction, having made all to win his point at Kildorrery the month before.

King said after his purchase for Beadles: "We’ve been looking for a long time for a proper Saturday horse for him, he’s been a good owner to me and we’re trying to up the game.

"I loved him as an individual, a big scopey horse who won his point very well."

The gelding is the third foal out of the unplaced Westerner mare Barrack's Choice, a half-sister to four winners, including multiple scorers Shantou Ed, Indifference Curve and Ardera Cross, who has chalked up no fewer than 15 victories, the latest at Ayr on Tuesday.

Lookaway appears another promising youngster for Ask, with the 19-year-old son of Sadler's Wells responsible for Grade 2-placed performers such as Ask Mary, Ask Susan, Ask Ben and Buster Valentine.

The Coronation Cup and Prix Royal-Oak winner had previously stood at the Beeches Stud and Dunraven Stud. He is standing his first season at Willow Wood Farm for a fee of £2,000.

Another six-figure Goffs UK graduate, this time from the Spring HIT Sale in May, was in winning action, although much further up north at Musselburgh.

The Player Queen, a point-to-point winner at Maisemore Park in October 2020 for Melanie Rowley, sold to Gerry Hogan and Rose Dobbin last May for £140,000, having made quite the impression in a mares' bumper at Cheltenham that April.

By Yeats and a relation to four winners, The Player Queen had won her first start over hurdles by seven lengths at Ayr and bounced back from a lesser effort last time out when outbattling the rather ironically named Oot Ma Way.

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