Danehill colt brings $1.05m

Hamilton
For the second year in a row, Te Akau's David Ellis has upstaged several of the world's most influential bloodstock buyers to purchase a sale high $1.05 million Danehill colt at Karaka.
Ellis went to $1.1 million to secure a Danehill-Grand Echezeaux colt, since named Darci Brahma at last year's sale. The horse was a debut race winner at Avondale on Monday.
At Tuesday's second day of the National Premier Yearling Sales, it was a case of deja vu as Ellis calmly went beyond the $1 million mark to secure his choice lot, a colt by deceased champion sire Danehill out of mare Beyond The Sunset.
"He was our pick of all the Danehills in the sale," Ellis said immediately afterwards.
"He was our pick of the colts and we thought he would make that sort of value.
"I'm ecstatic. It's hard to find colts like this one in New Zealand. He's a horse with an international pedigree."
Ellis said Tuesday's purchase was part of a deliberate move to buy a colt with the pedigree and potential to stand at stud as a New Zealand-owned stallion.
He said he wanted a well-bred New Zealand horse to stand at stud here rather than heading off-shore to stud, leaving New Zealand breeders to pay mainly service fees to overseas stallion owners.
Ellis had the colt fully syndicated by 5pm last night, though he wasn't able to reveal some of the members. Of the 10 shareholders, he could name Wellington property developer John Bromley, Auckland businessman Kerry Hoggard, Christchurch bakeries owner Ray Coupland and Paul Norling, all of them shareholders in Darci Brahma.
Ellis and Te Akau Stables trainer Mark Walker will share a one-tenth share, as they did in Darci Brahma before selling it.
"This was our last chance for Mark and I to ever get a top quality Danehill colt," Ellis said.
"Mark and I decided that after Darci Brahma showed Mark that he could really gallop, we would buy another one this year.
"We've got the clients at Te Akau who want to race horses at this level and we'll only buy more horses like this in the future."
Ellis said he had inspected the Danehill colt as a foal with his mother, again in the winter when he was weaned, then he had watched him parade four times in the lead-up to the sales at Pencarrow Stud.
"I thought he was one of the top foals when I saw him on his mother and he has continued to strengthen and mature. He's going to be a natural racehorse," Ellis said.
"We valued this colt at the same price as Darci Brahma. There's every possibility he's a colt who could be in the Golden Slipper, whereas with Darci, we bought to win the 2000 Guineas.
"He had the most wonderful outlook we could see. A lot of rein, a great eye ? he looked like he was ready to have a saddle put on him to go to the races now.
"He's really well developed, a nice two-year-old type of colt. This is great for New Zealand racing."
Pencarrow studmaster Leon Casey was thrilled to see one of the stud's Danehill colts sell for more than $1 million for the second successive year and noted the similarities to Darci Brahma.
"Temperament and constitution-wise, they are just identical, and that's typical of Danehill," Casey said.
"This colt is perhaps a little bit stronger than Darci Brahma but they've both got stamina in their dam side." ? NZPA