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Exceed And Excel took centre stage again at the Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale when Team Hawkes bought a colt for an eye-watering $1.8 million.

Darley's ever-popular stallion Exceed And Excel (Danehill) took centre stage again at the Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale yesterday when Team Hawkes came out on top of a spirited bidding battle with Coolmore to land a colt by the son of Danehill (Danzig) for an eye-watering $1.8 million — the most ever paid for a yearling by the sire. 

Standing just under the trees on the right of the auditorium, Wayne Hawkes went head-to-head with Team Coolmore, who were standing by the rails with the gavel eventually falling in favour of the father and sons duo. 

Hawkes said he had suspected Coolmore were looking to add the colt to their weeks purchases, when he saw Team Coolmore assemble in the sales ring: "He was the colt of the sale we thought, when Coolmore walked in about Lot 635 I said to MV [Magnier]: 'Here we got Lot 640' and he looked at me and said: 'Don't get aggressive' and I said:

'I'm not aggressive' and he just looked at me and smiled. To their credit Tom Magnier just came up and said 'Well Done'."

The Hawkes Team have enjoyed some great days with the progeny of Exceed And Excel, including when they sent out Exceedance to win the stallion-making Coolmore Stud Stakes (registered as Ascot Vale Stakes) (Gr 1, 1200m) in November and Hawkes is confident this colt can prove himself to be an elite level winner. 

"Everyone says Magic Millions and Golden Slipper and everything like that, but I've won a couple of them, the old boy has won four of them. I certainly know what it takes to win a Golden Slipper," said Hawkes. "The bottom line is, he's a beautiful, beautiful athlete. Which is what you are looking for."

Catalogued as Lot 640 and offered as part of the Cressfield Stud draft, the colt is the second foal out of dual Group 1-winning Strategic (Zeditave) mare Platelet, while further back this is family of Hockney (Quest For Fame) and Dalradian (Reward For Effort). 

The sale signalled another good result for Darley's Exceed And Excel and became his second $1 million lot of the week, after his son of out Dream In Colour (Frankel) was purchased by Tom Magnier for $1.1 million on Wednesday.

Later on in the day on Friday, Gerald Ryan and David Raphael provided Exceed And Excel with his third seven-figure yearling when they bought the colt out of Smokin' Alice (Smoke Glacken) for $1 million. 

Hawkes said colts out of Group 1-winning mares are hot commodities and rare for them to come on the market, so you have to pay a premium for them. 

"He's got the sire's side with Exceed And Excel, but when you see a dam, who has two Group 1 wins as a sprinter, it's very, very hard to find those mares," said Hawkes. "A lot of times, people don't sell the progeny out of those mares.

"When you see them, you have to pay for them, because they certainly aren't cheap.

"The end result, that was the easy part, the harder part is going home and make him run fast. But his attitude was outstanding, his pedigree is outstanding and John and Michael go okay, so I'm halfway there."

The trainer said he viewed the sales process as a 'test' for the yearlings to see how they cope with pressure, they are likely to feel when at a racecourse and says he learns a lot about their constitution during the inspections.  

"The sale is pressure on them," said Hawkes. "When they start playing up, we look at that very seriously. You can forgive and forget a little bit when they are cheap, but when they are this sort of price, they have to tick every box."

The Hawkes team have had much success when training colts, with the training partnership saddling the likes of Brutal (O'Reilly), All Too Hard (Casino Prince), Inference (So You Think) and Mossfun (Mossman) all to Group 1 glory and Wayne Hawkes revealed there was a secret to training colts. 

"I don't want to give too many secrets away," said Hawkes. "But it's just say we've got a lot of lovely horses that keep on making us look good. There is a knack to training colts, there is no doubt about that. Because, I'm going to say it, there are not many people who can continually do it.

"That sounds cocky and everything, but we are coming off Brutal and Exceedance in 2019, you won't get much better that a Coolmore and a Doncaster Handicap with two different horses," he continued.  

"We get it right more times than we get it wrong, but it's a lot of hard work and we've got a pretty good team around us that make us look good. 

"You certainly want a good start, because what you want and what you get at a yearling sale when you come and buy the one you want, it's a pretty big plus."

Earlier in the afternoon, it was Team Hawkes again, when they went to $600,000 for a colt by Newgate Farm's first-season sire Capitalist (Written Tycoon) on behalf of emerging owner Mr An. 

"He was a Capitalist and we thought he was the best colt in the sale," said Wayne Hawkes. 

"When you have a client who comes here and is willing to stump up for that it's fantastic - he's got the pedigree too. Capitalist was a great horse, he was a Golden Slipper winner, so hopefully we can get a job done with this bloke too.

"You come to the sales and want what you can get and sometimes those are two different things. We are pretty happy with him - he is a pretty special colt. As soon as we saw him we thought he was pretty special - I don't think there would be anyone here that wouldn't love him. We thought he was the best Capitalist and we had the owner standing right there to buy him, so it's great."

Catalogued as Lot 632 and offered by Element Hill, the colt is out of Listed-winning Galileo (Sadler's Wells) mare Perfect Truth, making him a half-brother to Queensland Derby (Gr 1, 2400m) Magicool (Fastnet Rock) and stakes-placed duo Perfect Dare (Fastnet Rock) and Kumming (More Than Ready). 

Perfect Truth herself is a half-sister to stakes winner Impressionist (Montjeu), while the colt's third dam is 1976 Cheveley Park Stakes (Gr 1, 6f) winner Durtal (Lyphard) - the dam of dual Group 1 winner Gildoran (Rheingold), Listed winner Lady Isis (Riverman) and the dam of Group 1 winner Roderic O'Connor (Galileo). 

The Hawkes' have put their faith in yearlings by first-season sires taking home progeny by Coolmore's American Pharoah (Pioneerof The Nile), Vinery Stud's Star Turn (Star Witness), Newgate Farm's Winning Rupert (Written Tycoon), Arrowfield Stud shuttler Maurice (Screen Hero), Waikato Stud's Tivaci (High Chaparral) and Kitchwin Hills' Sooboog (Snitzel) and Wayne Hawkes said they were happy to put their trust in them, rating them a very high-class bunch of unproven sires. 

"There are some really nice yearlings by first season sires, they have been really good horses and we have been happy to buy them," said Hawkes. 

"At the end of the day, we look at the type first and then we look at the pedigree second so when both fall into play that's when everything works out."

Josh Hutchins of Element Hill said he knew he had one of the best yearlings by the sire on the sales ground, but was unsure how the market would receive him. 

"It's a big relief. We knew that he was going to be a big colt during the sale with the good judges on him. We knew he was one of the best Capitalists in the sale and to achieve a result like that is phenomenal," Hutchins said. 

"Perfect Truth is a proven mare and we own a share in Capitalist and we have had plenty of success with first season sires and we have great respect for Newgate and Golden Slipper winners they generally always make it."