Riding colleagues Davis and Halpin spreading their wings with GS Bloodstock

Sean Davis and Gary Halpin have been involved on both sides of the floor during the first stages of the breeze-up season, an activity which could well continue during Thursday’s Tattersalls Guineas Sale.

The Craven Sale represented the formal debut of GS Bloodstock, with the two weighing room colleagues and longstanding friends preparing a Cotai Glory colt to change hands for 160,000gns. 

"Gary and I grew up together more or less and I lived with him for a couple of years when I first moved to the Curragh to become a jockey," says Davis.

"Initially we rode the breeze-up horses, Gary started that for different consignors and we’d often recommend horses through riding them to clients, sort of learning the trade and getting a bit of knowledge.

"Gary recommended New Energy to Sheila Lavery, he went on to be second in a Guineas and he went for only £65,000. We felt that we should use that knowledge to try to buy some horses that could be competitive. So we bought one ourselves and breezed it under Tally-Ho last year, and when he sold well for us it gave us the hunger to go at it at a higher level."

That horse, Song For Whoever, has now won a couple of races for John O'Donoghue and the business grew. The pair rent a yard on the Curragh and bought three of their own yearlings and were sent a few others to prepare. The return on the Cotai Glory, bought for €65,000 from Tally-Ho at the Tattersalls Ireland September Sale, represented a flying start. 

"We gave a nice bit for him and for an amount like that it's important you're confident you’ll see the return we did see for the risk you take," says Davis. 

"We would have a big involvement at Tally-Ho in the sense that [manager] Roger O'Callaghan guided us for a number of years at foal and yearling sales. We’d have a good look at their horses, we’d have a background on their pedigrees. 

"He was one that when we actually saw him we thought there wasn't a chance we’d have got him, we tried on one or two others, so when he fell our way we were delighted."

It is also a pleasure that the new buyer was rising star trainer Michael O'Callaghan.

'I actually started out as an apprentice with him, the yard that I rent with Gary, he actually had rented at that time also," says Davis. "If I’m honest, the model he’s had since he started has inspired me in what we’re doing ourselves."

The pair, who also achieved a reasonable result with a Dandy Man colt at Goffs UK, this week offer a Mountarmstrong Stud-bred Kodiac filly (lot 210) out of a half-sister to the Middle Park winner Supremacy.

Davis says: "She’s a fine big filly, she’ll be for the back end of the year and will progress into next year. Her fast work is good, she works to a good level and is one we’re excited to sell. She’s got a pedigree to match her ability and looks."

There is also one more for later in the month that Davis is counting down the days for.

"One of the ones we’re most looking forward to selling goes to Goresbridge," he says. "He’s an Inns Of Court we bought at Doncaster, again a sale we worked very hard and any we followed in we were very strong on.

"He was our number one at the sale, he cost £55,000 and a week on his half-sister by Mehmas, Believing, got us some black type and then last week she won a Listed race at Chelmsford. 

Sean Davis puts GS Bloodstock's Cotai Glory colt through his paces at last month's Craven SaleCredit: Laura Green

"We’re really looking forward to him, he’s a fine stamp of a horse who looks a seven-furlong or a mile type. We'd be just hoping he could be showing us in a good light there."

The operation works as a partnership, with Halpin in and around the yard every day along with his professional riding career, while Davis has now sent out his first runner, the seasoned handicapper Patsy Fagan, as a trainer. They also acquired a Sioux Nation filly for 150,000gns from Tally-Ho at the Craven who will form part of a small team.

"I got my licence and we’ve a good bunch of clients that were keen to buy at the breeze-up sales, to be running in two-year-old maidens in Ireland and trying to compete, more or less trade two-year-olds in the summer months," he says. 

"We've got six in training at the minute and a great team of staff keeping the show on the road when we’re at the sales."

Davis has ridden more than 80 winners, mostly on Britain's northern circuit during his time with Richard Fahey. Aged only 23, he is sensibly not bringing his jockey career to a halt just yet as he sees how the plan progresses.

"The training side was something I wanted to do; even when starting out as a jockey I was thinking about it at a later stage," he says. 

"At the age I am now, it wasn’t a thing I thought I’d be doing, but the business is very much trading in horses, not just training, and that’s the side I’m taking up with the help of Gary, who is in it as much as I am."

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