Records have tumbled across the board at the 2023 Magic Millions Perth Yearling Sale following an outstanding Book Two auction in the Swan Valley today.
$170,000 Playing God filly from Nickel Queen
A filly by former sale graduate and multiple Group One winner Playing God topped today's proceedings when selling to leading Ascot trainer Neville Parnham, in partnership with Ridgeport Holdings, for $170,000.
Parnham knows a lot about Playing God, having trained him during his successful racing career and now experiencing similar success with his progeny including Group One winner Kay Cee.
"To be honest with you, they come in all shapes and sizes and the only ones I probably shy away from are the smaller ones," Parnham said.
"I saw her at the farm about a month ago and she’s come on since then," Parnham reported. She's a good walker and I thought she was probably at the top-end of what we had to pay for her but she presented really smartly."
"She was one in the sale, despite it being very late, I was hoping I could purchase."
"She is not unlike Kay Cee, that filly, and Santo (Guagliardo) who bought the horse with me, he's had a bit of success with Uncle Mo as a stallion (through Delvecchio) and he then sold him on to Hong Kong for reasonable money, but he's gone well up there," Parnham said.
"So, we were happy to wait for the sale of this horse, but I did mention to him that she was one who did look a bit like Kay Cee," Parnham added.
Sharing second place on the leaderboard at the conclusion of the day were fillies by Long Leaf and Playing God respectively at $130,000.
Simon Miller secured the Long Leaf-World Class filly from the draft of Greenfields Lodge, while Paul Hunter secured the Playing God-Helene Miss filly from the Elvira Park consignment.
Across the day over $5.94 million was traded on 118 lots sold at an average price of $50,415 and clearance rate of 87%. This set new benchmarks for the Book Two sale gross, average and median prices.
The overall two day gross of $19.424 million was also a record and the clearance rate across both books is currently 89%.
Magic Millions Perth Manager David Houston was thrilled with the results of the past two days.
"It was very good," Houston said. "We’ve got to $19 million for the whole sale, we topped it (Book 2) at $170,000, up from $160,000 last year, we’ve sold $5.8 million as opposed to $5.6 million last year, we’ve averaged $50,000 as opposed to $44,000 last year, so we sold eight over $100,000, so it was fantastic."
"With everything that everyone had been saying, I was quite confident that we had a very strong buying bench here, for sure, and we had the interstaters come in and that helped no end."
"They’ve been away for a couple of years and they probably didn’t quite realise how strong things have been here, last year particularly, but they’ve gone away saying that they will come back and I am sure they will understand the business here a lot better next time."
"It is getting stronger and stronger. We all know it is fast horses that people want and the stud farms are improving for a number of years and it takes a few years for that to come to fruition and it certainly is at the moment."
"That is why you do it in any livestock industry. You need to keep reinvesting, bringing in new broodmares, so I will certainly be encouraging them to do it," Houston added.
To view the results of the sale or to make an offer an on a passed in lot click here.
The focus now switches to South Australia with the Magic Millions SA Raceday at Murray Bridge on Saturday March 4, before the next generation of racetrack stars go under the hammer at the Adelaide Yearling Sale at Morphettville on March 14 and 15.
To view the online catalogue for the 2023 Adelaide Yearling Sale click here.
BOOK 2 STATISTICS
(2022 in brackets)
Lots Catalogued: 150 (160)
Lots Sold: 118 (128)
Lots Passed In: 18 (17)
Lots Withdrawn: 14 (15)
Sale Gross: $5,949,000 ($5,694,500)
Top Price: $170,000 ($160,000)
Average Price: $50,415 ($44,489)
Median Price: $45,000 ($36,000)
Sold %: 87 (88)
COMBINED BOOK 1&2 STATISTICS
(2022 in brackets)
Lots Catalogued: 327 (338)
Lots Sold: 264 (272)
Lots Passed In: 33 (38)
Lots Withdrawn: 30 (28)
Sale Gross: $19,424,000 ($18,704,000)
Top Price: $350,000 (330,000)
Average Price: $73,576 ($68,765)
Median Prince: $60,000 ($55,000)
Sold %: 89 (87)
BOOK 2 TOP SELLERS
$170,000 - Playing God-Nickel Queen filly (Lot 304)
Vendor: Western Breeders Alliance / Buyer: Parnham Racing Stable/Ridgeport Holdings (WA)
$130,000 - Long Leaf-World Class filly (Lot 216)
Greenfields Lodge / Simon Miller Racing (WA)
$130,000 - Playing God-Helena Miss filly (Lot 274)
Elvira Park (As Agent) / PB & CA Hunter (WA)
$110,000 - Shooting to Win-Gemalileo colt (Lot 265)
Scenic Lodge (As Agent) / Jim Taylor (WA)
$105,000 - Rommel-Magic and Danger colt (Lot 293)
Mogumber Park / Simon Miller Racing (WA)
