Mick Goss – it’s a strange and uniquely South African phenomenon that our first season sires are treated with such caution
Mick Goss is always enthused when it comes to talking about Summerhill horses, but never more so than around sale time.
He is particularly excited about the first crop of Visionaires that will be making their NYS debut. “In any circumstance a new stallion’s progeny are exciting. In the old days of our real turf champions, the progeny of new sires really used to capture the imagination and pique the interest of buyers.
It’s a strange and uniquely South African phenomenon that our first season sires are treated with such caution. Obviously when times are tough, people go for what they know is tried and tested – that’s understandable – but I think we overdo it a bit.
In our case, Visionaire is a first crop sire, but he did leave a small crop of foals behind, so it’s not as though he’s a total unknown quantity. So far he’s had 12 runners of which 8 have been winners. Five of his runners have won multiple times and he’s already got a stakes winner and a stakes placed runner.
That’s a pretty good start given that he wasn’t a 2yo himself. Barry Irwin said that he’d been looking for a sire like this in South Africa, and to his credit he’s put his money where his mouth is and supported him. We’re really pleased with what he’s put on the ground so far. He is obviously magnificent to look at and he gets lovely big, strong horses, very much in his own mould.
Brave Tin Soldier has just fired from his first crop. Split The Breeze won first time out for Luis Cunha at Clairwood and Robbie Hill has a lovely filly called Flying Cross who’s had 2 starts, running 3rd first time out and winning on her second outing at Clairwood, beating a 5-10 shot!
Bankable only produced 1 crop here and there’s that old expression that as soon as a stallion passes on the progeny become world beaters. Well, we’ve got three on our draft and they’re lovely strong scopey horses – very much like he was really. Herman Brown told me that he weighed something like 650kgs in training.
He was a monster of a horse. He could fly over 6 furlong and he could fly over 10. He gave Raven’s Pass 6lb in a Gr2 at Goodwood and was only beaten half a length. Raven’s Pass ended up being voted best miler of his year! Bankable ran a short head to Eagle Mountain and half a length behind Campanologist. We all remember how good he was. One would expect the market to give a horse like that his due.
I just don’t understand the reticence when you’ve seen them run and you know what they can do and the product is standing in front of you. Look I’ve obviously got my stallions’ interests at heart, but I’ve seen it time and again and it’s mesmerised me. Look how hard it was for Silvano to get off the ground.
But people have got to know his progeny and look at him now! Jallad was the same, but people got used to his legs eventually and off he went. Jet Master had one high priced yearling in his first crop and he’s as good a racehorse as we’ve ever seen here. For all the great stallions of my era, the people who bought early on were the ones who capitalised. People are losing out on opportunities when they overlook first season sires. Once they’ve proven themselves, it’s too late. My advice is put up your catalogue and buy the buggers!
Summerhill does quite well with imports and we had three of our Aussies win recently – Rich Girl (Rock Of Gibraltar) won the Gr3 Strelitzia, Rio Carnival (Hussonet) won the Kings Cup and Ilitshe (Fastnet Rock) won the Derby Trial. Both those last two are on the roster of first round entries for the July.
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National Yearling Sale highlights
We’ve included two Australians in our draft this year and they’re both beautiful fillies. The first is by last year’s Aussie champion sire Exceed And Excel out of a stakes placed mare. Exceed And Excel has already produced the outstanding filly Guelph who won 2 of the 3 legs of Sydney’s 2013 2yo Triple Crown.
The other is by High Chaparral and I think it’s fair to say he’s pretty hot as stallions go right now. The daughter we’ve got on offer is very well related. Beyond that there’s the usual sprinkling of Silvano’s and Var’s.”
A few highlights we’ve picked out are (#499) a half-brother to Love Struck by Visionaire, (#24) a Brave Tin Soldier out of the family of Jungle Class, (#402) a Brave Tin Soldier filly from the Soho Secret family, (# 484) is bred on the successful Silvano / Al Mufti cross and a Muhtafal colt from the Party Time family (#508).
