A week on from claiming Adelaide Cup (Gr 2, 1200m) success with Silent Surrente (Fiorente), Will Clarken and Niki O’Shea secured a win in the sales ring when they went to $240,000 to secure a stunning colt by So You Think (High Chaparral) early on day one of selling at the Magic Millions Adelaide Yearling Sale.
Catalogued as Lot 25 and offered by Mill Park Stud, the colt is out of winning mare Miss Otto (Elusive Quality), making him a brother to Group 2 winner, and now Twin Hills Stud-based sire, Peltzer (So You Think).
Bidding ringside at the Morphetville sales complex, the stable’s racing manager Lachie Weekley was thrilled to snare the colt, who was knocked down to Clarken Bloodstock in partnership with Suman Hedge Bloodstock and prominent South Australian businessman Rob Chapman.
“He’s just got a lovely action and a really nice demeanour, beautiful head on him, great eye,” Weekley said.
“Very importantly he came off a terrific farm in Mill Park Stud down at Meningie, from Chris Watson and the team, their record is second to none and one of the best in the land.”
The partnership, who purchased four lots at this sale last year for a combined total of $285,000, had to stay strong to win the colt, and plan to continue the momentum on the second day.
“We were right at [our limit on him]. We wanted to be pretty strong on him, obviously he’s a quality colt so we didn’t want to miss out and there was some good competition as always, with those nice horses.
“The clients that we bought him for, they were keen to attempt to try and buy the best horse here and that’s what we saw him as. We did the job early and there’s a couple over the next day or two and that’ll be us.”
A close relation to 2019 Adelaide Guineas (Listed, 1600m) winner So We Are (So You Think), Weekley said the colt will be given time to mature and develop.
“He’s just a lovely horse and we’ll give him a bit of time. He’d be more that sort of three-year-old type. We’ll just let the ball come on to the bat.”
Mill Park finished the first day as the leading vendors by aggregate, having sold 12 yearlings for $1,031,000, the only vendor to break the million barrier.