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The careers of 29 first-season sires will be launched on the Gold Coast when the Magic Millions Yearling Sale gets underway on Wednesday.
The careers of 29 first-season sires will be launched on the Gold Coast when the Magic Millions Yearling Sale gets underway on Wednesday and many vendors and stud owners will be anxious to see how the newest recruits are received by buyers. However, two "first-season" sires will be represented by their first crop in Australian having already proven themselves a good source of winners.
The first US Triple Crown winner for 37 years, American Pharoah (Pioneerof The Nile) - arguably one of the most exciting stallions to hit Australian shores - has made an exceptional start to stud in the northern hemisphere, siring 27 individual winners, including four stakes winners headed by Grade 2-winning pair Four Wheel Drive and Sweet Melania. To strengthen his record further the stallion added his first three-year-old winner to his CV earlier this week when his son Phast Pharoah broke his maiden at Santa Anita.
Buyers on the Gold Coast will be hoping American Pharoah's brilliant start at stud can continue in Australia and his first offering on the Gold Coast totals 23 yearlings.
John Kennedy, farm manager at Coolmore Australia, believes American Pharoah has what it takes to take his stud career global in Australia.
"The feedback on his yearlings has been great and I think people have been very impressed," said Kennedy. "He has really stamps and his stock and they are a great bunch overall. The start he has had in the northern hemisphere gives us and, hopefully other buyers, confidence to back his yearlings in Australia."
Meanwhile, Woodside Park shuttler Cable Bay (Invincible Spirit) will also be represented by five of his first southern hemisphere yearlings this week with the stallion having also made a good start to his career in Europe.
The son of Invincible Spirit (Green Desert), who calls Highclere Stud home in the UK, has sired 27 first-crop individual winners, headlined by Molecomb Stakes (Gr 3, 5f) winner Liberty Beach and a further six stakes performers.
James Price, general manager commercial at Woodside Park Stud in Victoria, is confident Cable Bay has the credentials to translate his proven abilities as a stallion in Europe to Australia and, while he admits launching a new stallion's career does have a risk factor attached, there are obvious benefits to the sire already having had runners.
"It does have a different feel to it," said Price. "We are fortunate it has worked in our favour, it could have been a very different story.
"We are selling Cable Bay as a leading first season sire in Europe with all these winners, but it could have been horribly wrong and you wouldn't have heard a squeak out of us. There is still risk in it but certainly having comfort knowing he has already had winners.
"Buyers would certainly differentiate between Europe and Australia, so we are aware that in the buyers minds he is still a first season sire. When his progeny are being looked at he is still being assessed as a first season horse, so we have to sell the idea of who he is to Australian buyers."
Cable Bay is by Invincible Spirit, whose credentials as a sire of sires in Australia have been advertised by Yarraman Park's super sire I Am Invincible.
"The Invincible Spirit angle is obviously a great one with I Am Invincible doing amazing things down here, but he wasn't a Group 1 winner and neither was Cable Bay. The Invincible Spirit line is obviously very proven down here so that is a huge positive," added Price.
American Pharoah's race record speaks for itself, nine victories, eight at Grade 1 level and while all those wins were on dirt the stallion's progeny have shown an affinity for the turf.
"Number one for us as a farm we got a lot of confidence from the trainer Bob Baffart, who always thought he could turn his credentials to turf very easily," said Kennedy.
"We were very impressed with his initial foals and yearlings and after seeing what they can do on turf we have been blown away by it.
"I definitely think he is a horse that people have to take notice of down here and after the feedback we have had after the inspections so far we are really looking forward to getting the new year at the sales to a good start."
Cable Bay's invasion into Australia was a brainchild of Rick Jamieson, who carefully plotted every mare that visited the stallion at Woodside, which Price believes can give every potential buyer confidence in the pedigrees of every yearling by the stallion in Australia.
"The biggest romance about Cable Bay is the involvement that Rick Jamieson and Gilgai Farm have and that every mare has been approved by Rick to go to Cable Bay," he said.
"Buyers don't really have to worry about the page because Rick has approved it. Arguably he is statistically the best breeder in Australia to have someone like that approve that on the page and hopefully they like what they see in front of them."
Woodside will offer two fillies by Cable Bay at the Gold Coast this week and Price said they have been popular during the inspections and is confident they will sell well.
"We have two lovely Cable Bay's in our draft - they are both gorgeous and have been very popular. The pair are both very sweet and easy to do anything with sharp minded two-year-olds. Both have good shoulders and good hip, with good depth and have paraded very well. They have been very well received.
"They will sell well here because they are lovely types, but what is important to remember I think there are more rewards to come, we are not here just to cash in in the first year. He was brought here to make a stallion because the shareholders believe he can."
