By Emma Berry
The patchy trade seen throughout the breeze-up season so far this year continued at the first French auction of the year at Osarus's traditional venue of La Teste de Buch racecourse. From an original catalogue of 102 plus three supplementary entries, 81 horses ended up being offered for sale on Tuesday, with 49 of those finding a buyer at a rate of 60%, which was in fact up two points from last year's sale. Though the median figure dropped slightly from €14,000 to €13,000, the average posted reasonable improvement, settling at €23,585, up from €18,156 in 2017. Overall, turnover just breached seven figures, at €1,039,800.
Haras de Saubouas took up its familiar position at the head of the list, selling the top lot and the only six-figure juvenile of the day. The filly from the second crop of Haras de Bouquetot stallion Planteur (lot 78), a half-sister to three winners out of the Testa Rossa (Aus) mare Hijaziyah (Fr), clearly impressed Saubouas principal Paul Basquin throughout her sales prep to the extent that he ended up signing the ticket for her on behalf of a syndicate which plans to send her to local trainer Christophe Ferland.
“We liked her a lot and wanted to give her a chance in training,” he said.
The Pau-based consignor has now been the leading vendor at the Osarus breeze-up for the last four years and this time around sold eight lots for a total of €280,000. They included another who is heading to Ferland's stable adjacent to La Teste racecourse, lot 74, a colt by Le Havre. Sold for €70,000 to the trainer, the April-born colt is out of the Thunder Gulch mare Grenadia, a listed-placed winner in France as well as being placed in the GIII Pin Oak Valley View S. in the U.S.
Wherever his offspring end up in sales, Dark Angel (Ire) regularly plays a prominent role in proceedings and his sole offering at La Teste (lot 40) was the second-top lot of the day, bought by trainer Frederic Rossi for €90,000.
The wild-card entry, consigned by Yann Creff, is out of the unraced Manduro (Ger) half-sister to the Aga Khan's G1 Prix Vermeille winner Shareta from a strong black-type family which also includes the G1 Irish Oaks winner Shawanda (Ire) (Sinndar {Ire}) and her St Leger-winning son Encke (Kingmambo). Already named Sharela (Fr), the filly was bred by Haras de Beauvoir.
One of the early leaders and another from Creff's draft was lot 22, a Rajsaman (Fr) half-brother to the G1 Sun Chariot S. winner Sahpresa (Sahm) as well as six other winners. The colt was signed for at €75,000 by Nicolas de Watrigant of Mandore Agency along with Sylvain Vidal and he will race for a partnership including Gerard Augustin-Normand.
Overseas buyers at the sale included British-based trainers Paul Webber, Gay Kelleway and George Baker.
Assessing the day's trade, Osarus managing director Emmanuel Viaud said, “The figures have improved from last year so I am happy with that. We know that this has been a difficult market this year but our average price has improved and the good thing is that we have welcomed a number of new buyers to the sale this year. George Baker has previously bought at our September Yearling Sale but not at this sale and it was good to see him as well as some new faces from France.
“We have had lots of feedback from vendors and we know that it's important to offer a sale like this in the middle market in France as the market is very strong in Deauville for yearlings and breeze-up horses. We will now be starting our yearling inspections and we will be looking at between 800 and 1,000 horses for a catalogue of around 270 in September.”
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