Pair of Galileo yearlings top sellers at Tattersalls

A pair of Galileo yearlings were the $233,700 top sellers Monday at the Tattersalls December yearling sale in Newmarket, England. The one-day sale kicked off the annual Tattersalls December auction series with a higher gross but downturns in average and median.

A Galileo colt out of the Slew o’ Gold mare Golden Coral was the first to hit the sale-topping price of 140,000 guineas. Coolmore Stud, the leading buyer at Keeneland’s recently concluded November breeding stock sale, purchased the colt from Diane and David Nagle’s Barronstown Stud. The day’s top filly, also a 140,000 yearling by Galileo, is a half-sister to Toccet. She sold to bloodstock agent Charlie Gordon-Watson. Watership Down Stud was the seller.

The yearling session sold 194 yearlings for about $5,967,795. Compared year-to-year in the auction currency, guineas, that was up 3 percent from last season’s total for 153 yearlings. But the day’s average price of about $30,762 was down 19 percent, and the $15,026 median was 18 percent lower.

– Glenye Cain Oakford