Nagambie’s Yulong Stud, one of Victoria’s biggest racehorse breeding operations, is ready to finally put last year’s devastating floods behind them when they send 30 yearlings up to the Gold Coast for this month’s Magic Millions sales.
Only one filly won’t make the trip north after cutting herself in the floods, in what Yulong’s relieved chief operations manager Sam Fairgray described as “an extraordinary result”.
Yulong will put 30 yearlings through this month’s Magic Millions sale, all of whom survived October’s devastating floods. Sam Fairgray, pictured with mare Harlech.Credit:Jason South
Magic Millions’ Gold Coast sale is one of the country’s largest yearling sales, and kicks off a season which includes Inglis’ Premier Sale at Oaklands Junction in March and Easter Sale in Sydney.
And prospective buyers may need to fork out a record $300,000 on average – more than half the cost of a Surfers Paradise apartment – if they’re keen to own the next champion racehorse.
“I think Magic Millions, for the whole industry, is an important sale because it sort of sets the benchmark for the season,” Fairgray said.
“I think the market will be very strong, especially [at] the top end [it] is very, very strong. It’s important the middle and lower market is supported as well, and interestingly, there are a lot of good horses that come out of that part of the sale. But with prize money and so forth, I think it’ll be a strong sale.”
Since 2019, the average yearling sold in book one of the annual Magic Millions sale on the Gold Coast has risen from $239,809 to $294,476, and next month’s sales may see the average yearling sale surpass $300,000 for the first time.
Prospective buyers may need to fork out a record $300,000 on average – more than half the cost of a Surfers Paradise apartment – if they’re keen to own the next champion racehorse
That’s more than half the median price of a unit in Surfers Paradise, according to CoreLogic’s Best of the Best 2022 report, which listed the median unit price at $588,552.
Victorian vendors will sell more than 100 yearlings across the week-long sale, 30 of those from Yulong in Mangalore, just 10 minutes out of Nagambie, which lost two foals in the October floods.
“It was just a huge volume of water; it was quite extraordinary to think half the farm was covered in water that was 1.6 to 1.7 metres high,” said Fairgray.
“It was just incredible. We won’t see water like that again, I hope.
“It’s a three-year plan when you try and get these horses to the sales, and when you get them two weeks out from starting their preparation for sale, and you get a flood like that, it definitely does put a different spin on things.”
Thankfully most of the yearlings being sold later this month were on higher ground, but a number of broodmares in particular required saving from the waters.
But those floodwaters have now subsided and Yulong can continue its mission to become one of the country’s most prolific producers of star racehorses.
This selling season will see the first yearlings of Australian Guineas winner Alabama Express go through the ring, while a number of blueblood yearlings – a Snitzel filly out of Viddora and an I Am Invicincible colt out of In Her Time – headline Yulong’s Magic Millions draft.
Fairgray said he expected record prizemoney levels in Australia to continue to drive the demand for yearlings.
“The COVID thing, people getting into horses with their disposable income [drove the market],” he said.
“But [with] prize money, globally, Australia is right up there and internationals want to race horses in Australia. It also helps with the international money coming in, and for what stallions are selling for, it helps people putting colt syndicates together and so on.”
Yulong’s headline stallion Written Tycoon will be the most represented sire at the Magic Millions sale, with 55 yearlings to go through the ring.
The first foals of Everest winner Yes Yes Yes will also be a talking point during the January 10-16 sale, which is complemented by the rich Magic Millions 2YO Classic race day on January 14.
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