'We had to dig very deep' - Walsh's Sioux Nation filly heading to Twomey after €370,000 sale-topping swoop

Those old sages say that lightning never strikes twice but whoever devised that cliche would be eating their words if they were present at the Tattersalls Ireland Breeze-Up Sale on Friday as a very familiar electrical storm made its presence felt during a livewire sale, that was building on last year's record-breaking returns with several hours of trading still to be done.

At the 2023 renewal of the sale, Grade 1-winning jockey Katie Walsh brought a Sioux Nation colt to the sale and he topped the charts, making €240,000 to Mark McStay for Paddy Twomey. Named Letsbefrankaboutit, the colt went on to win the Group 3 Round Tower Stakes at the Curragh later in the summer.

Twelve months on, Walsh brought a daughter of the Phoenix and Norfolk Stakes winner to Tattersalls Ireland, and once again she stopped the clocks in one of the quickest times up the Fairyhouse straight on Thursday. 

Consequently, the half-sister to six winners was in demand among the free-spending buyers, but it was the familiar team of the Avenue Bloodstock mainstay and the trainer who could saddle his first Classic winner at the Curragh on Saturday, when he runs A Lilac Rolla and Purple Lily in the Tattersalls Irish 1,000 Guineas.

Incidentally, both fillies were purchased in this sales ring, with Purple Lily, a first-crop daughter of Calyx, bought by McStay for €155,000 from Brian O'Connell's Chasefield Stables at last year's breeze-up sale.

The successful agent had to go to €370,000 here to fend off his rivals, who included Anthony Stroud, for the third-crop daughter of Sioux Nation.

The Greenhills Farm Sioux Nation filly bought by Mark McStay for €370,000 at the Tattersalls Ireland Breeze-Up SaleCredit: www.healyracing.ie

He said: "The filly speaks for herself and came highly recommended by Katie; she did an outstanding breeze. We had to dig very deep but there are no regrets; let's hope she’s lucky. 

“The new owner is very happy and delighted to be able to send another horse to Paddy. I’m delighted to get her and she looks like she’s one who can rock on fairly soon."

Walsh purchased the filly for €60,000 as a yearling and has enjoyed another brilliant breeze-up sales season. McStay was keen to praise the work done by the Cheltenham Festival winner, whose track record as a breeze-up consignor is even surpassing her accomplishments as a jockey. 

"Katie does a great job, she’s one of the best in the business, her recommendations stand for an awful lot,” he said.

“The filly was extremely well produced and did a superb breeze. I’m not a clock worshipper but she did clock very well, and Katie got paid accordingly."

The filly from the family of Irish Champion Stakes and Tattersalls Gold Cup winner Luxembourg was one of four punchy purchases by McStay for Twomey. 

The pair went to €140,000 for Willie Browne's Dark Angel colt out of Morsian, a Dubawi half-sister to Listed winner Mistrusting, dam of Grade 1 winners Mysterious Night and Althiqa, out of the Cherry Hinton Stakes winner and Cheveley Park Stakes runner-up Misheer.

They also bought a Teofilo colt from Mickey Cleere for €120,000 and Leamore Horses' Starspangledbanner colt out of Tingleo from the family of Bosra Sham for €90,000.. 

Having been such a prolific purchaser, McStay was well placed to comment on trade seen at Fairyhouse and beyond.

"The breeze-up consignors put a lot of money down, they put a huge amount of effort into it, and it doesn’t always come off,” he said. “This year a lot of the middle market has been really tough for them, and when they get a good one like this they’re entitled to get paid. The demand for good horses around the world is as strong as ever."

Of the Tattersalls Ireland Breeze Up Sale, he added: "Every year this sale produces. The timing is good, it gives the consignors a little bit of extra time, and they can take a later horse."

Conor Hoban's career as a jockey came to an end only last winter when he announced his retirement, but Beechlea Bloodstock, the pre-training and consigning business he operates, has been going successfully for a couple of years and the blue livery of the Laois-based farm was flying high with the sale of a first-crop Earthlight colt for €300,000 to David Spratt of Gaelic Bloodstock.

Beechlea Bloodstock's colt by first season sire Earthlight made €300,000 at Tattersalls IrelandCredit: www.healyracing.ie

Unlike so many of the other leading lots, the chestnut was not a pinhook, rather being sold on behalf of Rathcairn Stud, clients of Hoban, and he was delighted to have achieved such a brilliant result for the team.

"He’s a lovely, big, strong horse, owned by Rathcairn Stud, who bred him,” he said. “We got him before Christmas, we prepped him and he’s just kept progressing all the way. He’s big and I thought he did a lovely breeze yesterday, finishing out really well. He’s an exciting horse going forward and we wish his new owners all the best.

"We’re delighted, it’s a great result for the owner and everyone in the yard. We’ve had a great two weeks and this is the best result we’ve had – it’s credit for the team at home and the work they’ve done."

The colt is a half-brother to two winners from three runners out of the winning Lawman mare Elusive Laurence from the family of Classic winners Bachelor Duke and Sonnyboyliston. Such was the confidence behind him, Rathcairn Stud were willing to back their judgement if the market did not meet their valuation.

Hoban added: "We had high expectations coming here based on the colt's homework, and the owner was prepared to race him if he didn’t make his money because he’d shown us plenty at home. We thought he'd sell well but we got more than we thought."

Beechlea has produced nine horses for this breeze-up season and all have sold, including a recent €285,000 sale, and Hoban said: "It’s important they can go on now and do it on the track. 

Conor Hoban's excellent breeze-up season continued at Tattersalls Ireland, where the recently retired jockey sold an Earthlight colt for €300,000Credit: www.healyracing.ie

“It’s been a good season for us, and we’re looking forward to getting back involved for next year. A lot of credit has to go to Tattersalls Ireland for today – there’s a great turnout, plenty of horses are getting bought and this is definitely the strongest sale we’ve been at this spring."

Matt Coleman and Stroud's agency was among the most prolific of purchasers at the top end of the market with Coleman signing for a pair of juveniles at €270,000 apiece on behalf of his clients while Stroud, who was thwarted in his pursuit of colts by Earthlight and Sioux Nation, signed at €125,000 for a Kodi Bear filly from Hyde Park Stud.

Coleman's first big purchase of the day sparked joyous scenes between Fethard neighbours the Tynan family, who bred the colt, and Ryan Conran and Pamela O'Rourke of Lacka House Stud, who sold her to the agent for €270,000.

The story goes back almost 11 years to the Tattersalls Ireland September Yearling Sale of 2013 where Matty Tynan purchased a Fast Company filly from Derryluskin Stud for €8,000. Tynan produced her to win a Naas maiden on her third start and she then finished fourth in the Marble Hill Stakes, which was at the time a Listed contest on Irish Guineas weekend. 

Named Coto she won four of her 34 starts over five seasons and was retained as a broodmare given she is a half-sister to Listed Celebration Stakes winner Insignia Of Rank and Mayleaf Shine, second in the Arran Sprint Stakes at Ayr. The family traces back to the blue hen Best In Show.

Tynan was mulling options for the April-foaled bay and it was the friendship between his son Matty Junior and Ryan Conran that nudged him in this direction.

Stephen Byrne (centre) reacts to the congratulations offered following the sale of his Coulsty colt for €200,000Credit: www.healyracing.ie

Tynan said: "We had two plans; to either do this or race her ourselves – my son is very friendly with Ryan and sorted this, we thought that if she did not make her money we could then train her. I'd love to have raced her, but if you can get a hand of money, you are not going to win it racing."

Tynan trains her Holy Roman Emperor half-sister and Coto has a foal on the ground.

He added: "The mare had an Arizona colt this year and is being rested this year to get her covered earlier next year."

Conran, who Con Marnane credits with the success of Different League, has extensive experience in the breeze-up business not just with the Bansha House family but Thomond O'Mara of Knockanglass, who is married to Conran's aunt Roisin. 

Having been an integral part of those operations, he and O'Rourke have been consigning under Lacka House for about four years and could have a Group winner to add to his achievements this weekend. Wootton Bassett colt Ecureuil Secret contests the Gallinule Stakes at the Curragh on Sunday for Edward O'Grady and Aidan Ryan on the back of an impressive Leopardstown maiden win and a close fourth in the Listed Tetrarch Stakes earlier this month.

Conran bought Ecureuil Secret as a yearling in France and sold him to O'Grady privately last summer after the breeze-up season had concluded. The Sioux Nation filly has been in his yard for a considerable length of time, and possessed star quality from the start.

A packed Tattersalls Ireland sales ring watches Lacka House Stables' Sioux Nation colt make €270,000Credit: www.healyracing.ie

He said: "This filly came to me in October and she has been brilliant ever since and we're just delighted to have the opportunity to sell her for our neighbours and good friends. We have had a great year, we had a good bunch of horses, we had nine to sell and they have all sold, sold well and gone to good homes. This is by far the best result, we are very lucky, and it's great for all the Tynan family, I am very grateful to them for giving us this chance.

"I try and let the horses do the talking on the track, and thankfully it all went well and she backed up her homework. She came and breezed smartly, we were not surprised. But she has to go on and be good now, she has sold for a lot of money! I think she will be lucky for the new owners."

Coleman was bidding from the bridge and referenced her clock-stopping abilities when speaking after purchasing her.

"It was the breeze that really stood out for us," he said. "She is a very smart filly, she breezed in one of the quickest times of the day. She is a filly with plenty of size, scope and quality, from a very fast family. She is by a proven sire and out of a mare who was pretty smart herself. 

"In my opinion Sioux Nation is upgrading his mares, and this mare could run anyway and has thrown a filly with plenty of talent the way she breezed."

Coleman's later buy was a proper pinhooking touch landed by the maestro Browne and his family. They bought the Profitable colt who is the first foal of winning Dandy Man mare Fleeting Princess for just €6,000 at the yearling sales last autumn and the purchase yielded €270,000 on Friday.

The colt's second dam, Queen Of The Tarts, is a Royal Applause half-sister to Duke of York Stakes winner and Haydock Sprint Cup runner-up Assertive and the Listed-winning sprinter Boogie Street, who was second in the King's Stand Stakes.

It was that fast lineage and his own display of speed which caught Coleman's attention.

"He is a very good-looking horse, well recommended by Willie Browne and his team," he said. "He is bred to be quick being by Profitable and out of a Dandy Man mare and he certainly looked to be quick. It is obviously a fast family further back, too. 

"He did everything he needed to in the breeze yesterday and then vetted very cleanly, and he was attractive to many buyers".

Coleman added: "He is a big, strong horse who should be ready to rock and roll and, hopefully, he will be fast as a two-year-old. He also has plenty of size and scope so he should be more than just a two-year-old."

It was a family connection that prompted the Mocklershill team to be interested in the colt at the yearling sales. They pinhooked his dam Fleeting Princess as a yearling, in this ring, for €16,500 from Clonbonny Stud, as Browne explained.

Hyde Park Stud's Too Darn Hot colt got the six-figure lots going at Tattersalls IrelandCredit: www.healyracing.ie

"His dam was very fast and we liked her," he said. "My partner Tracey [Kearney] spotted the pedigree, and it is a complete family job; Tracey, me and my son Jamie. We are over the moon.

"Speed is everything, thankfully we had it here, though in fairness he was always a good-looking horse. It is a great story for us."

The 2023 sale set new records for the auction and it was apparent from early in the day that trade would be electric with the fourth horse in the ring making €210,000.

At that price, Richard Brown of Blandford Bloodstock saw off Grand National-winning trainer Emmet Mullins to land the second-crop son of Too Darn Hot, another consigned by John Bourke.

The Mullingar consignor and breeder's pedigree was cited by Brown as one of the deciding factors in his purchase

"The stallion is doing it everywhere and he looks really special, that sire line is prepotent," he remarked of Too Darn Hot whose first northern-hemisphere crop contains Group 1 Moyglare Stud Stakes winner and Irish 1,000 Guineas second-favourite Fallen Angel, while Group 1 Champagne Stakes victor Broadsiding is a member of the Dubawi stallion's first southern hemisphere cohort.

"This colt comes from a very good hotel and John has sold some very good horses including Cachet [1,000 Guineas winner]. He is a real baby still, as he is just a May foal so to breeze as well as he did is very promising.

"There is a proper frame there and he will grow into it so he'll be going in a field for a month now. I was going to say that some good weather and sunshine would help him but looking around, there isn't much chance of that!"

He added: "He will go to Richard Morgan-Evans and will jog in the mornings and then have his afternoons in the paddocks."

The Blandford team bought a total of eight horses during the sale with one other six-figure purchase among them; Ardglas Stable's filly from the first crop of Sussex Stakes winner Mohaather.

Sarah Dempsey with Stephen Byrne's Coulsty colt that topped most time charts at Tattersalls IrelandCredit: www.healyracing.ie

Bidding for Go Racing, they went to €105,000 for the half-sister to a pair of winners by Dandy Man out of Quintessenz, a daughter of the late Soldier Hollow from a strong German family that includes the country's 2022 champion juvenile filly Quantanamera and Que Belle, successful in the Preis der Diana and Henkel Rennen (1,000 Guineas).

Last year a total of four horses sold for €200,000 or more and that figure was bettered on Friday with no fewer than six horses attaining prices at that level, no sale more poignant than that of the Coulsty colt who came out on top of most time lists during the breeze on Thursday morning.

The Byrne family of Knockgraffon Stables are grieving the loss of their son and brother Michael, a retired jump jockey who died unexpectedly earlier this month.

The Coulsty full-brother to High Cloud, who won a juvenile maiden for Michael Halford prior to his transfer to Hong Kong, was purchased by the Byrne family for €21,000 as a yearling and on Friday brought €200,000 from Brendan Holland, bidding on behalf of trainer Kevin Ryan. The sale prompted emotional scenes around the sales ring among the family's many friends and supporters.

It was a quicksilver edition of the Tattersalls Ireland Breeze-Up Sale, which also recorded an increase in the number of six-figure price tags year-on-year with 20 horses making at least €100,000 compared with 18 last year, which was a record for the auction.

The clearance rate hit 89 per cent, which was an excellent return and illustrative of the diverse and hungry cast of buyers assembled for the sale by the teams at Tattersalls Ireland and Irish Thoroughbred Marketing. A total of 219 horses from the 245 offered found buyers during almost 11 hours of trade at Fairyhouse on Friday.

An aggregate of €9,544,500 was an all-time high for this auction and represented an increase of 11 per cent year-on-year from the previous record turnover. The average of €43,582 showed a gain of one percentage point from last year's sale, which was also a record figure, with the only cloud on the horizon the median, which declined by seven points in 12 months to €28,000.

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