Little Big Bear Crowned European Champion Juvenile

Little Big Bear (Ire) has been named Europe's champion juvenile for 2022 and becomes the 12th European champion 2-year-old to have been trained by Aidan O'Brien.

The son of No Nay Never, who was bred by Camas Park Stud and Summerhill, achieved his top rating of 124 for his seven-length rout in the G1 Keeenland Phoenix S. at the Curragh. The victory was the culmination of four straight wins in five starts, including the Listed Windsor Castle S. at Royal Ascot and the G3 Anglesey S.

“We always thought from day one he was very good and we were very surprised the first day that he got beat, but with 2-year-olds that can happen,” said O'Brien, who noted that the G1 QIPCO 2000 Guineas is the aim for Little Big Bear.

“He always showed plenty of speed, but when he stepped up to six furlongs he did really improve and I remember Ryan saying he'd get seven on his ear after the Phoenix S.

“He's by No Nay Never, who is a big influence on speed, but there's a good chance that a mile could be within his compass this year. We're looking forward to seeing what he can do.”

The Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board (IHRB) handicapper Mark Bird added of the champion juvenile, “His dominant performances in taking the G3 Anglesey S. and the G1 Phoenix S. propelled him clear of his rivals in the race to be Europe's top 2-year-old from an early stage of the season and whetted the appetite for what promises to be an exciting 3-year-old career.”

Three of the top five colts in the ratings were trained at Ballydoyle by O'Brien. Blackbeard (Ire), another son of No Nay Never who won the G1 Darley Prix Morny and G1 Juddmonte Middle Park S., was ranked five points below his stablemate and equal with Chaldean (GB) (Frankel {GB}) in joint-second on 119. The latter, trained by Andrew Balding for Juddmonte and bred by Whitsbury Manor Stud, was the highest-rated juvenile trained in Britain. Blackbeard retired to Coolmore Stud at the end of last season and was the subject of plenty of interest during last weekend's Irish Stallion Trail.

Juddmonte's racing manager Barry Mahon confirmed that Frankie Dettori, who has announced that he will retire at the end of this season, will keep the ride on G1 Darley Dewhurst S. winner Chaldean.

“I spoke with Andrew last week about it and he was of the same mind that Frankie seemed to click well with the horse and in their two starts they built up a good rapport, so we definitely wouldn't look to be changing anything there unless Frankie has a commitment anywhere else,” Mahon said.

“Frankie has been a phenomenal jockey for so many years. He's been phenomenal for the sport and is loved and adored all around the world.

“We're very much looking forward to the next 12 months. Hopefully we'll be able to retain his services plenty as we've a few nice horses with the Gosdens and elsewhere, and Frankie is always top of our list when he's available.”

Along with Chaldean, the Juddmonte operation also has homebred and 113-rated Nostrum (GB) (Kingman {GB}) as a potential Guineas contender this year.

“In an ideal world I suppose we would like to keep them apart, with possibly one running in the English Guineas and the other going to France or Ireland,” Mahon added.

“But there's a lot of work to be done yet and if something had a little setback along the way it would be nice to have a replacement to fill in for the English 2000 Guineas. I think we'll aim for both of them to head towards Newmarket for the time being and get a bit closer and sit down with the Abdullah family and see what they'd like to do.”

Ballydoyle's leading Derby hope, Auguste Rodin (Ire) (Deep Impact {Jpn}), was assessed with a ranking of 118 for his victory in the G1 Vertem Futurity Trophy, a mark which puts him level with the G2 Qatar Richmond S. winner and Dewhurst runner-up Royal Scotsman (Ire) (Gleneagles {Ire}) and the leading 2-year-old filly of 2022, the Aga Khan's Tahiyra (Ire) (Siyouni {Fr}).

O'Brien added, “We think Auguste Rodin is a very good horse. We were nearly not running him in the Vertem Futurity as he's a lovely, big, slick horse and we were worried about the ground.

“He's a very good mover with a good mind, we always thought he'd be a better horse at three and we think he'll get middle distances, so the plan with him is he'll probably start in the Guineas and see where we go from there.”

Of the exciting Tahiyra, Bird added, “She set off impressively in the illustrious hoofprints of her half-sister and Breeders' Cup heroine Tarnawa, when winning at Group 1 level on just her second start.”

Tahiyra is the first European champion 2-year-old filly for her trainer Dermot Weld and the latest for her owner-breeder the Aga Khan following the great Zarkava (Fr) in 2007.

Adding to O'Brien's impressive roll call of 2-year-olds in 2022 was the GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf winner Victoria Road (Ire), a breakthrough winner at the highest level for his young sire Saxon Warrior (Jpn), who also made the top 10 on a mark of 115. His stablemate and fellow Breeders' Cup winner Meditate (Ire), yet another top juvenile by No Nay Never, was awarded 114.

“It was only when we stepped Victoria Road up in trip that we started to get the best out of him,” O'Brien commented. “He could be a French Guineas or French Derby-type horse.”

Charlie Appleby and Godolphin were responsible for two of the leading colts, with the G2 Gimcrack S. winner Noble Style (GB) (Kingman {GB}) awarded 117 and Silver Knott (GB) (Lope De Vega {Ire}), who was beaten a nose by Victoria Road in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf, on 115.

The John and Thady Gosden-trained Commissioning (GB) (Kingman {GB}), owned and bred by Isa Salman and Abdulla Al Khalifa, was the second-highest-ranked filly in Europe on a mark of 115. Unbeaten in her three starts last year, including the G1 Fillies' Mile and G2 Rockfel S., she was rated highest of all juvenile fillies trained in Britain.

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Value Sires Part I: Profitability from the Top

Value is relative. A homebred yearling by a lowly stallion who goes on to reap rich rewards on the track, or one by a more fashionably expensive name who brings a bonanza return in the sale ring could each be considered to have offered 'value' for their breeders.

In a slight departure from the norm for this annual series, we will be looking at the profitability of stallions in four key price brackets according to their yearling sales returns of 2022 set against their fees at the time of covering, in this case 2020.

The average profit has been determined by the stallion's fee plus a figure of £20,000 for keep fees. The profitable stallions featured must have had at least five yearlings sold in 2022 to make the list and prices have been converted to sterling from Euros according to the conversion rate on the day of the sale.

If we are to start anywhere, it may as well be at the top, with those rarefied specimens who have usually earned the right to stand for a fee of the equivalent of £50,000 or more.

Unless you've been sleeping through the last few years of sales, then it will not come as a newsflash that if you have a correct yearling by Dubawi (Ire) or Frankel (GB) then the likelihood is that you will be well paid. And you deserve to be: after all, they are the two most expensive stallions in Europe, covering only the glitterati of the equine world. At last year's Book 1 of the Tattersalls October Sale, nine of the 10 most expensive yearlings were by one or the other (the top four by Frankel), and that extended to 20 of the top 30, with sales from the stock of those two stallions (once all yearlings are paid for) amounting to almost 29% of the turnover of Book 1.

Dubawi is currently king of the hill, the newly crowned champion sire of 2022, and his sale-ring results reflect his excellence on the track with an average yearling price from the 28 sold last year of £796,481, giving him an average profit in excess of £500,000 when factoring his 2020 fee and keep for the mare and yearling. Of these elite stallions tabled here, Dubawi had the smallest number of offspring at the sales, and that will likely reduce further still in the years to come with his book being wisely limited by Darley as he enters his 18th season at stud.

For stallion watchers, one of the most interesting elements of the next few years will be to see how many times the champion sire baton is passed between Dubawi and Frankel. It has happened once so far, and with Frankel's assured ascent as both racehorse and sire, it will be hard to keep him off the top spot. Forty-three of his yearlings made him the only other stallion with an average price north of half a million at £584,192, which was 3.3 times his 2020 fee of £175,000 (which has now risen to £275,000).

Breeders who have supported Siyouni (Fr), Kingman (GB) and Lope De Vega (Ire) were generally well rewarded for yearlings sold last year. Siyouni has never shuttled but his popularity extends to both hemispheres, and the demand for his yearlings was stronger than ever last season. With a whopping 63 sold he showed an average profit of £173,792, and his 2020 fee of €100,000 has subsequently risen to €150,000.

Kingman was already at £150,000 in 2020 but he still shows a tidy return, with his average sales price of £328,787 translating to average profit of £158,787. Lope De Vega is another who has won over plenty of international buyers with a sterling reputation across the Atlantic and Down Under. That truly global appeal is of huge benefit when the elite sales of Britain, Ireland and France boast increasingly diverse buying benches, and the swaggering son of Shamardal pulled in an average yearling price of £245,561 last year, which was 2.7 times his fee and gave him an average profit figure of £134,439.

Of course it is hard to determine exact profit margins. Keep fees vary from farm to farm, as do consignors' charges, and any vet bills ensued are unknowable beyond the horse's owner at the time. The latter can change as well, with a number of horses having previously gone through foal sales, and some of the youngsters will have been bred under foal-share arrangements. The basis of this exercise, however, is on the assumption that each yearling is being sold by its breeder and was the product of a nomination sold at the advertised fee.

Sea The Stars (Ire) doesn't have quite the cachet attached to him as some of his rivals, which remains both surprising and disappointing as he is unquestionably a top-drawer stallion. Now 17, he had a sizeable number of yearlings at the sales last season. Of his 91 offered, 79 were sold, and on the face of it their £237,965 average price amounted to average profit of £81,282.

The only new boy in this list was Dubawi's son Too Darn Hot (GB), who started out at exactly £50,000 with an average price of £118,304, generally putting breeders who supported him in credit, with his average profit weighing in at £48,304.

No Nay Never had perhaps the biggest break-out year of any stallion in 2022. He topped the Orby Sale with a €2.6million filly, though as we know, she is one of the horses who remains unpaid for by her buyer. However, as a full-sister to his dual Group 1 winner Blackbeard (Ire), she is unlikely to fall much below that level, if and when she is re-evaluated by interested parties.

These yearlings were conceived in the year that No Nay Never's fee had shot up to €175,000 from as low as €17,500 three years earlier, so there was already much confidence behind him from the Coolmore team, and that certainly appears to be justified. An average price of £226,671 gave him average profit £47,207, and one of his biggest problems in the years to come could be the competition he will face from his own sons. Blackbeard has joined him at Coolmore this season, and Ten Sovereigns (Ire) will have his first juvenile runners in 2023, while Little Big Bear (Ire), Meditate (Ire) and Trillium (GB) are among No Nay Never's enticing 3-year-old prospects.

And then to the brothers. What a pair of stalwarts Invincible Spirit (Ire) and Kodiac (GB) have been for the Irish National Stud and Tally-Ho Stud respectively. Now 26, Invincible Spirit's fee is listed as private this year and he stood at €100,000 when his current 2-year-olds were conceived, with a 2022 yearling average of £124,293, while Kodiac, a proper blue-collar stallion, grafted his was up from a starting fee of €5,000 to his four-year high of €65,000 which was eased for this season. The latter is now 22, and both horses have helped plenty of breeders along the way. The number of their sons and grandsons at stud stands testament to both their popularity and their success.

With some exciting young stallions on the rise, the likes of Night Of Thunder (Ire), Baaeed (GB), New Bay (GB) St Mark's Basilica (Fr), Mehmas (Ire), Zarak (Fr) and Palace Pier (GB) will be represented in this bracket in the years to come, some having been pitched straight in at this level on the back of a stellar racing career, others gradually working their way up thanks to the results of their progeny.

They say it's tough at the top, and it is even tougher to get there, which is why my pick of this celebrated bunch is Ballylinch Stud's Lope De Vega. It is easy to be wise in hindsight, but a dual Classic winner retiring to stud at a fee of €15,000 looks very good value indeed. After a dip to €12,500 in his third and fourth seasons, he set about marching up the price list and has commanded a six-figure fee for the last four seasons. That puts the 16-year-old out of the reach of many, but for those who are able to avail themselves of his services then, as this table shows, Lope De Vega is still the breeder's friend, just as he has been throughout his career, and especially for those shrewd enough to have bought a breeding right in him at the start.

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Nothing Standard about Master of All Trades

Question. After Taylor Made, which consignment sold the most yearlings in a single sale at Lexington this year? Here's a clue. Its principal also co-manages the company that hosted record turnover at the same auction.

If you need an extra steer, this gentleman additionally manages the syndicate behind the hottest stallion of his type in the land. Yes? No? Well, okay, does it help if we add that he also put together the ownership of a record-breaking mare that banked $5.5 million on the track?

Enough already. Because if you haven't identified David Reid by now, that will only be because you aren't making the sideways step from our own business to the world of Standardbreds.

Somehow, though both call for many common attributes, there tends to be relatively little crossover. But the energies driving such a remarkable resume have in recent years tipped Reid over the confines of one environment to embrace parallel challenges, albeit on a milder scale, in the other. And while he resists any delusion that he might replicate the game-changing impact he has had on harness racing, he certainly showed a pretty immediate touch with Thoroughbreds.

Indeed, one of the earliest investments of the Ice Wine Stable he established with another major Standardbred force, Frank Antonacci, has since become one of the most upwardly mobile Thoroughbred stallions in Europe. No Nay Never, who entered Reid's life as a Scat Daddy yearling found by Wesley Ward in 2012, has rapidly catapulted his fee at Coolmore from €17,500 to €175,000.

The Preferred Equine sales agency Reid founded with the late Geoff Stein in 1989 has meanwhile developed a Thoroughbred division; while besides a customary handful with Ward, Reid and Antonacci have another eight or nine with the latter's son Philip, who had made a promising start to his Thoroughbred training career over the past two years.

If it's hard to condense the sheer breadth of Reid's engagement, then there's no mistaking the twin columns supporting it. Because you can only try all this stuff with an exceptionally questing, an energetic nature; and you could only pull it off–most obviously in simultaneously operating the Lexington Selected Yearling Sale ($65.3 million trade this fall, at an average $73,690) and its premier consignment (145 head sold for $11.3 million)–by having the absolute trust of fellow horsemen.

“I do love action,” Reid acknowledges. “We breed, we race, we trade. If we can go somewhere and try to be successful, we're going to try it. On the other hand, we don't like to fail. I just always want to do things on the up and up. Integrity's number one. But yes, for sure: I do love the sales, I love marketplaces. It is a unique situation, where you can be a sales manager, at a major sale, and a consigner at the same sale, but I also consign at all the other sales. And I've been able to handle those two positions within our industry with no problems whatsoever, for nearly 30 years.”

As so often, elite achievement turns out to be founded in a stubborn humility. Recalling the quarter-hour or so Reid and Ward spent with the Queen of England in the royal box, after No Nay Never won the G2 Coventry S. at Ascot, he says: “Well, listen, I'm a country boy. I grew up on a farm, and never would have dreamed to have that opportunity. You kind of pinch yourself. I must say that Wesley and Her Majesty did most of the talking!”

The point is, this modesty is seamless with the way he describes the evolution of a portfolio that feels pretty unique in the wide world of horsemanship.

“Listen, education wasn't my strong suit,” he says with a shrug. “So I'm probably more of a trial-and-error type of guy. Or the old thing of imitation being the best form of flattery. So I watch successful people, and people who are less successful, and just try to figure out what they might be doing right or wrong. But challenges every day are good. I do have a lot on the go, a lot of irons in the fire. But I have good staff, a good team, so I have been really blessed with that as well.”

So far as Thoroughbreds are concerned, he certainly associated himself with an exemplary model from the outset: initially when introduced to Ward one day at Saratoga, just down the road from the dairy farm where Reid was raised; and in turn when paired with the Coolmore partners in No Nay Never.

“Meeting Wesley is really how we got the ball rolling in the Thoroughbred business,” Reid says. “We'd had horses with him a couple of years when he called me up from Keeneland and said, 'Listen, there's a horse here might be falling through the cracks. He just has a little maturity issue, but that's no problem for me, I can back off him.' Everyone has success stories after the fact. But I can sit there in church on a Sunday morning and tell you Wesley Ward was always a believer in that horse, right from the hammer. And the early training reports were fabulous, he was already telling me in February how talented the horse was.”

So it was that a failed pinhook–No Nay Never had slipped from $170,000 in the same ring as a weanling to $95,000 at the September Sale–actually proved precocious enough to make a trademark Ward debut at the Keeneland April meet, win at Royal Ascot and then return across the water to win a Group 1 in France.

“And the whole time we understood that [Coolmore] was obviously an outstanding organization from A to Z,” Reid stresses. “Truthfully, they've been great partners on all levels. There's nobody, in my opinion, that knows the trading and breeding of horses better. They have a size and scope that's fascinating to me. Obviously, Mr. Magnier believed in Scat Daddy for a long time, the whole team has bought into it, and it's been outstanding for all involved.”

But even partnership with the best in the Thoroughbred business couldn't supplant Stein as the most precious influence on Reid's career. Their paths first crossed when Reid took a job after college on a Standardbred farm near Saratoga, where a bunch of horses incautiously leveraged to a bank were sent for a repossession dispersal. A couple of appraisers were sent up from New York–and one of them turned out to be Stein. They jumped into the back of a pickup together and hit it off so well that eventually they would combine their talents, downstate in Westchester, for 25 years until Stein's abrupt and premature loss in 2012.

“We built it up together, Geoff and myself,” Reid explains. “Started small, very small. But part of the reason why we're where we are today, in my opinion, is that at the time you couldn't feed two families just being an agent. We had to diversify. So you start buying mares, syndicating stallions, a little bit of everything. And that way you just increase your knowledge, as you go along, tenfold.”

One of the things that really got them rolling was a deal put together for the emerging Moni Maker in 1995.

“I'd like to think she's known all through the horse world, having retired as [then] the richest female of all time, regardless of breed,” Reid notes. “She had an international career, raced here at two and three and then she went to Europe from four through seven. So she kick-started us a little bit.”

From this side of the fence, however, what's most interesting is Reid's curiosity for fresh perspectives as such a seasoned achiever on the other.

“In the Standardbred industry, the market is a little more regional,” Reid reflects. “We really have no Asian market, for instance, no California market per se. Whereas the global market of the Thoroughbred industry is fascinating. Because within that, you have more turf racing in Europe, dirt racing here, sprint racing Down Under. That's very intriguing and makes a diversified market, which obviously creates interest from all over the world. I would certainly say I've enriched my knowledge greatly by participating in the Thoroughbred market, and that it has helped me manage my Standardbred one better.”

Not that each industry will invariably absorb innovations from the other. Staging the first Standardbred 2-year-old sale, for instance, proved a limited success; it was from the Standardbred registry, equally, that the Thoroughbred community borrowed and then renounced a proposed stallion cap of 140 mares.

So far as the latter is concerned, the most obvious divergence between the breeds is artificial insemination, which heightened Standardbreds' exposure in genetic diversity. But nor, it turned out, was like being compared with like in experimenting with a 2-year-old sale: even the most precocious Standardbred won't master its vocation in presentable fashion before June at the earliest.

“They train down in a more structured way, don't have the ability to go race speed naturally,” Reid explains. “They have to learn the gait; and they have to learn their endurance. From December all the way through June, they're dropping X seconds every month. So it's a whole progression. We tried it, and I'm not saying we won't revisit it: we actually had some success with horses that went on and did well. But it was more difficult because of those differences, and now we have mixed sales in July and August that allow the horses to get there and go on and race.”

A more successful emulation has been online trading, Reid having observed how necessity became the mother of invention for many bloodstock auctions during the pandemic. In February, he opened an online portal that has been renewing as often as every two weeks. One dynamic he observed, towards the end of the summer, was the trading out of stock to fund the next cycle at the fall yearling sales.

“Obviously we've seen the success that they had down in Australia and New Zealand with the online market,” Reid remarks. “I watch Fasig-Tipton and Keeneland doing their onlines, and we follow Tattersalls and Arqana from afar. So that's another thing we bit off, in 2022, that adds to the craziness! But in fairness, we've been very satisfied. With horses that race on a much more frequent basis [than Thoroughbreds], we're finding success marketing online through our networking connections and clientele.

“I'm still a huge believer in the live market and live auctions. Probably a certain segment of the bloodstock industry will always be that way. But we've found that fluidity in the marketplace allows owners to create their own calendar for turning over their assets.”

For all his restless, imaginative endeavor, Reid is not trying to reinvent the wheel. He stresses the modesty of his Thoroughbred imprint–measurable in dozens, as against 1,000-plus Standardbreds processed by his agency every year–and the simple pragmatism of any adaptations learned.

“We've done a little bit of everything,” he says. “We've done 2-year sales, with other consigners; we've consigned yearlings ourselves up in Saratoga and Kentucky. But listen, it's only ever been on a small-time basis. There's a lot of knowledgeable people in the Thoroughbred game. And it's a deep marketplace. When we're marketing [Standardbred] yearlings, in our industry for the most part it's the trainers doing the physical inspection and selection. Whereas the Thoroughbred market is very agent-driven.”

But then the Thoroughbred itself, after all, is a different beast. Standardbreds soak up more racing–Moni Maker won 19 of 20 starts as a 3-year-old–and are built to do so.

“I think they're hardier, for sure, with more bone,” Reid says. “But more importantly, regardless of the gait [i.e. trotter or pacer], they always have two hooves on the ground at one time. I think that is probably a big factor [in their soundness]. Also Thoroughbreds, in the gate, go from zero to 40 in a matter of seconds. Whereas for Standardbreds it's mostly mobile starts.”

And a different stamp of horse can produce a different horseman, too.

“I think so, yeah, I'm probably a different bloodstock evaluator, in that I would prefer to see horses off the shank and in the field,” Reid remarks. “That's just my upbringing. It's probably not a popular trait, especially in Thoroughbreds, but maybe it's sometimes a bit of an edge or niche.”

Exploring the Thoroughbred world, for Reid, has partly been a natural leakage of curiosity and partly sheer circumstance. Since 2005, for instance, the Lexington Selected Yearling Sale has been renting Fasig-Tipton's facility and everyone, from Boyd Browning to the grooms showing the stock, encouraged Reid that his skills were surely somewhat transferable.

Now there has been fresh impetus from Philip Antonacci, a Flying Start graduate who has sampled the methods of elite Thoroughbred trainers all round the world. Reid's association with the Antonaccis goes back to the Moni Maker days. The family has long operated a prominent Standardbred nursery, Lindy Farms in Connecticut, while Frank is also an owner of the Red Mile harness track in Lexington. But Philip's “defection” to Thoroughbreds has already yielded a Grade II podium with Fauci (Malibu Moon), while he has had two winners from four starters at the current Aqueduct meet.

“Frank is supporting his son and it's beautiful to see,” Reid says with enthusiasm. “Frank and his brother Jerry have been incredibly successful building up their businesses up in the Northeast, and they take it to the next level whenever they can. They're very hard-working, frugal people who have been in the business generationally.

“I've known Phillip right from birth. So it all evolves, just keeps going. I know that I wouldn't be where I am today without my Standardbred industry clients having been so very loyal. Just as my staff, my friends, my colleagues are all a huge part of my success. And truthfully, that's probably the main reason why people succeed or fail: your relationships, within your organization and externally.”

Sure enough, that's exactly how he has cultivated the Thoroughbred dimension to his career.

“In the last six or seven years, we definitely are more involved,” Reid says. “We have more mares, we have shares, we breed. But there's a lot of segments in this business where you have to be well capitalized, you have to be well networked. And networking takes a long time. But I think we're doing well. I guess longevity is worth something: we've been around a long time, and hope to be around for a long time to come.”

Needless to say, the core Standardbred operation never stands still. Reid's latest excitement is managing a meteoric young stallion, Walner, a share having recently been auctioned for $750,000.

“Obviously we've been very successful in the Standardbred business, and that's still our primary focus,” he reiterates. “But you have to be conscious that things are always changing, always moving. Right now, we have a pulse on all aspects of the Standardbred industry. The Thoroughbred business, huge as it is, it's harder to get a global pulse on it. The two are interconnected at some level, but still vastly different.

“I wouldn't call their different ways of doing things right or wrong, just different. We all think we're great judges of a horse. But we've all seen horses that we don't judge fair go on to do superior things; and the opposite, where you think something is going to be spectacular and it's disappointing. So is it the training method? Is it the environment? Is it the personalities involved? Is it the micromanagement?”

All he knows is that two factors are essential to every horse, of any breed: luck, and aspiration.

“There's always been a Standardbred marketplace, but I would like to think that we've raised a level of professionalism in that space in the last 30 years,” Reid says. “But it doesn't matter what you do, you have to be lucky. I'm a big believer that stars line up for a reason. But I'm 57, and still wake up every morning, very eager to learn, to try different things and continue to grow. And I hope I never lose that inspiration, because when that day comes, I don't know what I'm going to do.”

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MG1SW Alcohol Free Pops at 5.4M at Tattersalls December

Four-time Group 1 winner Alcohol Free (Ire) (No Nay Never) reeled in a cool 5.4million guineas final bid from BBA Ireland to highlight Tuesday's second session of the Tattersalls December Mare Sale in Newmarket. Out of the placed mare Plying (Hard Spun), she was consigned by Andrew Balding's Park House Stables on behalf of Littleton Stud. A half-sister to listed winner Alexander James (Ire) (Camelot {GB}), the 4-year-old is responsible for annexing the G1 Sussex S., G1 July Cup, G1 Cheveley Park S. and G1 Coronation S.

 

 

 

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