Mare tops $2 million at Tattersalls sale

Diary, the dam of European champion sprinter Total Gallery and carrying a Galileo foal, brought more than $2 million Tuesday at the Tattersalls December mare sale in Newmarket, becoming the highest-priced horse sold at a European auction this year.

The price in the local auction currency was 1.3 million guineas, or about $2,143,050.

The buyer was Pearl Bloodstock, a Qatari group led by Sheikh Fahad al-Thani. The same syndicate privately purchased Total Gallery earlier this year. They also stand Group 1 winner Makfi, another private purchase this year, at Tweenhills Stud. The farm's manager, David Redvers, signed the ticket for Diary after outbidding Peter Makin, who had entered the fray by shouting his initial bid of one million guineas to the Tattersalls auctioneer.

Diary, by Green Desert, also is the dam of Lady Darshaan, Group 1-placed last year at 2. Lady Darshaan was due to sell later in the session.

"She could go to any stallion we want, but we would like to send her to Dubawi and try and replicate the mating that produced Makfi," said Redvers. Makfi is by Dubawi and out of a Green Desert mare. "Of course, we might not get in to Dubawi, but you would think that Darley would be thrilled to get a mare of such quality for him."

Redvers said he and his clients paid close to their estimation of Diary's value and that Pearl Bloodstock intended to breed the mare's foal both to race and to sell.

The Castlebridge Consignment sold Diary.

Diary's 2010 colt by Tamayuz topped the final day of the Tattersalls December sale on November 27 when Blandford Bloodstock paid Coleman Stud 200,000 guineas, about $329,700, for him.