A colt by Frankel bought by American heavyweight John Stewart in a new partnership with Team McEvoy, shared top billing at AU$1 million (US$620,700, AU$1=US$0.62) with a son of Toronado described by respected breeder Ric Jamieson as possibly his best product of the year on a reasonably robust first day at the Inglis Premier Sale March 2.
Rosemont Stud reaped dividends from its recent investment in foreign mares and support of its home auction when the Frankel colt became the second million-dollar lot in the Geelong farm's history, knocked down to Resolute Racing's Stewart in partnership with the horse's future trainers Tony and Calvin McEvoy and their regular partners Belmont Bloodstock.
The purchase brought some consolation as the first horse for Stewart and the McEvoys. They were underbidders on the Home Affairs filly out of Tony McEvoy's former star mare Sunlight who topped January's Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale at AU$3.2 million.
As for the co-session-topper bloodstock agent Andy Williams swooped on behalf of a Hong Kong owner to secure Gilgai Farm's Toronado colt, who'll soon be gelded and groomed in New Zealand ahead of transfer to the territory and a trainer yet to be determined.
The two magnificent colts highlighted a decent opening session Sunday which, like Inglis Classic, largely defied the worst fears of vendors shaken by softness in the bottom half of the market at the Magic Millions Gold Coast and Karaka. Sunday left Inglis Bloodstock CEO Sebastian Hutch pleased with "a reasonably encouraging day's trade."
At the close of auctioning at Oaklands, the average was AU$148,364 (US$92,090) and the median AU$110,000 (US$68,277). With a clearance rate of 70% and expected to rise, 176 lots had been sold and 76 passed in. The gross was AU$26,124,000 (US$16,215,167).
That compared with the book 1 average of AU$127,600 and median of AU$90,000 last year, off a clearance rate of 82%. On day one last year, 216 lots were sold and 36 passed in, with the gross AU$28.16 million.
Hutch said that he was pleased with how things played out in the opening session.
"If you'd said to me at the start of the day this would be the set of figures we'd end up with, I'd have been very pleasantly surprised," he said. "We've cleared 70% and that's going up. The gross has been solid, the median is up year-on-year, and the average is up year-on-year.
"The clearance is slightly down but not significantly, and so while there are very evidently challenges in the market, and parts of the market that are more difficult than what they were through 2022 and 2023, I think really it's been quite an encouraging day."
The two million-dollar colts were the fourth and fifth to reach seven figures at Premier. An I Am Invincible colt fetched AU$1.4 million in 2017, while AU$1.1 million was paid for both an I Am Invincible filly in 2023 and a Written Tycoon colt in 2021.
