'He’s a great physical type' - A$1.9 million Too Darn Hot colt lights up Magic Millions

High end bloodstock is, in many ways, much like art – they’re collectors’ items and tend to hold their value.

And if what’s transpired at the Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale over the past two days is anything to go by, that matra holds true.

At any rate, it certainly does for Fairway Thoroughbreds’ John Camilleri, who has spent two decades investing in high-end broodmares and breeding them to the world’s best stallions.

In a session which yielded eight million dollar lots, taking the sale’s tally to 12 after two days, during a two hour period on Wednesday Camilleri sold three million-dollar colts,

Trainer Ciaron Maher paid A$1.9 million (£1m/€1.16m) for a Camilleri-bred son of Darley shuttler Too Darn Hot, the current sales-topper, while Coolmore’s Tom Magnier went to A$1.75m for a Snitzel colt. The James Harron-purchased A$1m Zoustar colt got the seven-figure ball rolling for Fairway Thoroughbreds. 

Colts by Extreme Choice (A$1.6m), Snitzel (A$1.3m) and fillies by I Am Invincible (A$1m) and first-season sire Ole Kirk (A$1m) also changed hands on day two, as across-the-board demand from owners and trainers continued on from Tuesday.

Peter O’Brien, general manager at Segenhoe Stud, who offered the Fairways Thoroughbreds-bred yearlings, believes Camilleri’s extraordinary results are a testament to the Sydney businessman’s willingness to invest significantly to acquire elite breeding stock and breed to a diverse range of commercial sires.

“He’s a pleasure to deal with," said O'Brien. "He’s got some of the best mares in the country, breeds them to the best stallions and he deserves the results.

“He’s got three A$1 million horses today and it’s a big day for him.”

The Too Darn Hot colt’s dam, dual Group 3 winner A Time For Julia, was bred and raced by Camilleri, while the Snitzel colt’s mother was a A$510,000 yearling purchase who carried the owner’s silks to three wins and two stakes placings. The dam of his seven-figure Zoustar colt, the stakes-winning Villami, was purchased privately off the racetrack.

Leading into Wednesday, O’Brien found it hard to split the Snitzel colt and the son of Too Darn Hot and with Wednesday's result the latter became the most expensive yearling sold in either hemisphere by Too Darn Hot. He is also the most expensive yearling sold in Australia by a European shuttle sire.

“We were going into today and we knew we had the Villami, the Warranty and him,” he said.

Too Darn Hot: in-form sire was in demand at Magic MillionsCredit: Darley

“I was saying to John, it’d be touch and go who makes more between A Time For Julia and Warranty.

“John is always about quality – he’s got quality mares and sends them to quality stallions.”

Maher, who signed for the current sale-topper, fended off fellow Victorian trainers Peter Moody and Lindsay Park’s Ben, JD and Will Hayes to buy the yearling, who spent an enthralling five minutes in the ring.

The beautifully bred colt is the fifth foal out of A Time For Julia, a mare whose pedigree is filled with black-type winners, including Time Thief, Foreplay, Blue Gum Farm’s Group 2-winning first-season sire Sejardan and champion South African mare Laisserfaire. The colt is her fifth foal and she has already produced the Camilleri-raced stakes winner As Time Goes By.

“[Too Darn Hot has] done really well in Europe and we’ve got a few Too Darn Hots in the stable that are starting to hit their straps now, and [this is a] really good damline,” said Maher.

“He’s a great physical type, he’s got a really good mind on him and obviously he ticks all the right boxes.”

Ciaron Maher: buyer of the session-topping Too Darn Hot coltCredit: Daniel Pockett / Getty Images

Too Darn Hot is already the sire of three individual southern hemisphere-bred first crop juvenile winners, including Saturday’s leading Magic Millions 2YO Classic contender Arabian Summer.

Maher has bought 12 yearlings across both days, either outright or in partnership. 

He said: “The sale has been really buoyant. I thought it might be a little bit soft given the climate we’re in, but they have a way of bucking the trend and there has certainly been very good buying.”

Coolmore is ever present at all the major sales around the world and Tom and MV Magnier made their presence felt again, buying the Snitzel colt out of Warranty.

He is the second foal out of the stakes-placed three-time winning mare, herself a three-quarter sister to Wahng Wah, the dam of Street Gossip, winner of last season’s Princess Stakes in Queensland. 

“He was a real quality horse and Peter O’Brien has had this horse on top for a long time,” said Tom Magnier. 

“When we saw him at the farm we liked him a lot and he’s been very professional here at the sale. He was the star colt of the week and we’re delighted to get him.”

Meanwhile, Harron’s syndicate races this season’s Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott-trained Breeders’ Plate winner Espionage. The colt was spelled immediately after his Group 3 win, with connections choosing to bypass the Magic Millions carnival to instead focus on a Golden Slipper campaign.

Armed with that potential bullet to fire, Harron was prepared to stump up for Camilleri’s colt, the first foal out of Listed winner Villami, who was herself bought privately from her trainer Gerald Ryan by Harron on behalf of Fairway Thoroughbreds.

“Rosemont were very strong on him, James Harron bought him online – he’s a very clever, tricky customer – and James sourced the mare for us for John Camilleri, so he knows how good she was,” said O’Brien.

“She was a very fast mare, is a beautiful-looking mare and he’s a real elite two-year-old type.

“James was actually underbidder on our Zoustar colt [on Tuesday] so it was great he got this fella today.”

Of his “ripping” new colt, Harron said: “I loved him from the time I saw him at the farm. I also thought he’d progressed really well from the farm to the sales ground and just knocked it out of the park while he was here.”

Segenhoe also sold a Zoustar colt to Te Akau Racing’s David Ellis for A$1.1m on Tuesday and are setting the standard in terms of average, having sold 11 lots for an average of A$769,091. The farm finished Wednesday with an aggregate of A$8,460,000, which was bettered only by Newgate Farm, whose gross sat at A$8,785,000. 

Coolmore also buys Grenville’s half-brother to Think About It 

Two of Australia’s biggest industry players duked it out in a lunch-time auction ring battle for the final chance to buy a relation to arguably the country’s best sprinter, reigning Everest champion Think About It.

It was Coolmore’s Tom Magnier who dug deepest, going to A$900,000 for the Tasmanian-bred Wootton Bassett colt, the last foal of Tiare. Magnier fended off the Rosemont Alliance to ensure the horse would join Coolmore’s colts syndicate and Chris Waller has been elected to train the colt. 

Wootton Bassett was strongly represented at Magic MillionsCredit: Colin J Kenny Photography

The McCulloch family’s Grenville Stud, whose previous highest-priced yearling was a A$550,000 2021 Inglis Premier-sold son of Deep Field, purchased the colt’s dam for A$150,000 at the 2021 Magic Millions National Sale when she was in foal to Pierro.

It was before the emergence of the Joe Pride-trained sprinter, a A$70,000 Premier yearling, who has gone on to win 11 of his 13 starts, A$11,259,175 in prize-money and send the appeal of the McCullochs’ colt soaring.

They subsequently sent Tiare, a half-sister to Group 2-winning sprinter Keen Array, to first-season Coolmore shuttler Wootton Bassett, proven in the northern hemisphere from humble beginnings in France prior to being purchased by the Magniers. She died in July last year.

“We’re just lucky we had a horse like this and he turned out to be such a nice horse,” said Graeme McCulloch, who runs Grenville Stud, near Launceston, with his son Bart.

“I’m glad Coolmore have got him, he’ll get every chance there and hopefully he does well on the track and they stand him at stud.

“It’s just a relief to have him sold now and we don’t have to worry about them.”

Wootton Bassett has sired 40 stakes winners in the northern hemisphere, nine of them at Group 1 level, including Cambridge Stud shuttler Almanzor and Swettenham Stud’s Wooded.

“Whatever he touches seems to turn to gold,” Magnier said of the sire.

“He got great support at the farm, we loved the types, we’re selling a lovely filly later in the week out of Avantage and we couldn’t be any happier with the way he’s going.

“Fingers crossed he kicks the same goals down here that he does in Europe.”

It’s not the first time Grenville and Coolmore have done business together, the McCullochs and Magniers having bred the Caulfield Cup winner Mongolian Khan.

“They’re lovely people, great breeders and in fairness they had that horse looking fantastic all week,” said Magnier.

“They’re just lovely people so you’d be delighted for them to get a result like that. I was delighted for them.”

Subscribe to make sure you never miss updates from Australia, New Zealand and beyond and to have ANZ Bloodstock delivered to your inbox every day