Radcliffe springs back into action with purchases at Saratoga

After spending over $7.6 million at breeze-up sales in Europe and North America this spring for fledgling Phoenix Thoroughbreds, agent Kerri Radcliffe jumped back into action at the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga selected yearling sale, buying a pair of colts for a total of $975,000 during the opening session on Monday.

Radcliffe confirmed that the sons of Will Take Charge and Into Mischief were secured on behalf of Phoenix but said that a decision has not been made on whether the colts ultimately will be aimed at racing in Europe or the United States.

“There’s a possibility they’ll go to Europe,” she said after bidding on the colts from a seat in the front of the pavilion with her husband, Newmarket-based trainer Jeremy Noseda, at her side. “We’ll sit down and talk about everything. We just need to buy the nice racehorses first and then we’ll decide where they go after that.”

Radcliffe’s purchases came at the end of the session, with the Into Mischief colt the last yearling led into the ring as Hip 112.

Produced by the stakes-placed Yes It’s True mare Yes Liz and from the family of Chimes Band, a Group winner in France and a multiple graded winner in the US, the athletic bay colt was bred by Stonestreet Farm and offered by Francis and Barbara Vanlangendonck’s Summerfield, agent.

“He’s a lovely horse,” Radcliffe said, “and Into Mischief is a great stallion who upgrades his mares unbelievably.”

Kerri Radcliffe (middle): is among the leading breeze-up buyers in America and EuropeCredit: Sarah Farnsworth/Goffs UK

Just five lots earlier, Radcliffe struck for the flashy chestnut from the first crop by American champion Will Take Charge and out of multiple stakes winner Winter Book, by Any Given Saturday. The colt’s family includes Star of Gdansk, a Group winner who placed in both the Derby and Irish Derby as well as in the Irish 2,000 Guineas.

“He’s gorgeous - a beautiful horse,” Radcliffe said. “He’s by a first-season sire, I know, but from a great, great consignor who gets proper results.”

Gerry Dilger’s Dromoland Farm offered the colt, who was bred by SF Bloodstock and reported sold for $220,000 as a weanling to Salvisa Bloodstock at the Keeneland November Sale. Dilger co-bred this year’s Kentucky Derby winner Always Dreaming and was involved in pinhooking 2016 Kentucky Derby winner Nyquist.

Radcliffe said the Saratoga yearling purchases will be sent to Kentucky and evaluated prior to decisions being made on where they will be sent later.

Among Radcliffe’s breeze-up purchases for Phoenix, a Luxembourg-based investment group whose principals have not been identified to date, was a record-setting €1.4 million Street Sense colt bred by Godolphin in Kentucky. Sold at Arqana in May following his acquisition for only $15,000 at last year’s Keeneland September Yearling Sale, that colt has been named Walk in the Sun and is awaiting his debut with Noseda.

Other Radcliffe acquisitions, including the $1.7 million Congrats filly Diamondsandpearls bought in March at Ocala, is in training with Bob Baffert. Diamondsandpearls won her first start in July at Santa Anita Park and finished fourth in the Grade 2 Sorrento Stakes at Del Mar on August 5.