Mastercraftsman Colt Brings Arqana Record
Description:
A winning Mastercraftsman colt named Dance of Life was bought for a sale record €400,000 (US$445,061) July 1 on the final day of the Arqana summer sale, which closed with record sales.
Total receipts broke €7 million for the first time, at €7,128,000 ($7,931,500), up 30% from the 2015 auction. The average settled at €31,401 ($34,940), a 22% increase. For the first time, fillies in and out of training as well as broodmares were added to the catalog, which featured breeze-up 2-year-olds, horses in training, and National Hunt store horses.
The sale-topping Mastercraftsman colt, a 3-year-old who won going about 1 5/16 miles June 16 at Saint-Cloud, will ship to Australia to Ballymore Stables and trainer Mike Moroney following his sale to Robert Nataf of Horse France. Nataf was bidding on behalf of Moroney's brother Paul Moroney.
"He has the ideal profile to succeed in Australia as a progressive 3-year-old who combines speed and the ability to stay a mile and a half," Nataf said of the colt offered by trainers Carlos and Yann Lerner.
He is out of the stakes-placed Exceed And Excel mare Above Limits. Second dam Cin Isa Luv, by Private Account, is a half sister to U.S. grade I winner Script Ohio and grade III winner Young Daniel.
The addition of fillies and broodmares to the catalog proved a success with 50 of the 62 (81%) females on offer changing for an average price of €23,670 ($26,341). Three of them commanded prices in excess of €100,000, including Wadyhatta, a 4-year-old daughter of Cape Cross offered by Haras du Mézeray in foal to Authorized. Nataf landed her for €275,000 ($306,058), the highest price among them.
A half sister to two listed performers, 4-year-old Wadyhatta won twice in 10 starts for Sheikh Hamdan. She is out of the Anabaa mare Thamarat, a stakes-placed juvenile and half sister to the dual group 1-winning miler Tamayuz. The family traces back to one of the most influential mares in the stud book in Allegretta, meaning that Urban Sea, Sea The Stars, Galileo, Born To Sea, King's Best, and Anabaa Blue all feature on the catalog page.
"You only need to look at her pedigree to understand why I wanted her," Nataf said. "She will foal down in France before shipping to America to be covered by one of Coolmore's stallions."
Arqana president Eric Hoyeau was pleased with the record-setting sale.
"It is very satisfactory to see the summer sale set two historical records for turnover as well as highest price," he said. "The challenge with horses in training sales is to gather the horses who match the criteria of the global market. As we could see over these two days, every horse with the right profile sold well. The new breeding stock section also returned positive results, with a high clearance rate.
"Finally, the technological innovations we have introduced, more recently the online repository we unveiled at this sale, have been very well received and generated some increased confidence from our buyers—this is a small sample but both yesterday's and today's top prices had vet files available on the repository."