Tattersalls: Figures increase across the board at February sale

Tattersalls Ltd. in Newmarket, England, conducted its one-day February mixed auction on Thursday and reported gains in all major economic categories. The sale was topped by the 5-year-old gelding Sovereign Debt, runner-up in last year’s Group 1 Lockinge Stakes, who was purchased for 145,000 guineas (about $248,500).

On Thursday, 172 horses were sold for gross receipts of 2,166,600 guineas (about $3.71 million), a 24 percent gain compared with the 2013 February sale. The auction posted an average price of 12,597 guineas (about $20,560), a 37 percent gain, and a median of 6,750 guineas (about $11,000), up 35 percent compared with last year. The buyback rate was 20 percent, an improvement over 22 percent in 2013.

Trainer Dandy Nicholls bought Sovereign Debt from the consignment of Michael Bell’s Fitzroy House Stables. The Irish-bred Dark Angel gelding has won four of 20 starts and earned over $200,000, and has placed three times in stakes, including his second to Farhh in the Lockinge. His hammer price is the highest ever at the Tattersalls February sale for a colt or gelding in training.

The auction’s second-highest priced horse, Enharmonic, was bought for 90,000 guineas (about $154,280) by Blandford Bloodstock’s Tom Goff. The filly was bred in Kentucky by consignor Juddmonte Farms and is by E Dubai, the sire of Breeders’ Cup Classic winner Fort Larned. She has made one career start, an unplaced effort last year at Leicester in England, but Goff said that the 3-year-old would become a broodmare.

Enharmonic’s dam, the Nijinsky II mare Musicanti, has also produced Group 1 winner Distant Music and Group 3-placed New Orchid; the latter is the dam of Group 1 winner African Rose and Group 3 winner Helleborine. U.S. champions Vanlandingham and Temperence Hill are members of Enharmonic’s extended female family.

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