Yulong purchasing as Ace Stud were active during the first session of the Tattersalls December Mares Sale overnight purchasing three of the top five lots including the session topping half-sister to Sunday’s Japan Cup winner Calandagan for 850,000 guineas.
CALIYZA looked a likely highlight of the opening Sceptre Session even before her half-brother CALANDAGAN’s brilliant win in the Japan Cup on Sunday, and the Overbury Stud consigned five-year-old topped the first day of the December Mares Sale at 850,000 guineas to Ace Stud, bidding online.
It was a swift return to the Tattersalls sales ring for the daughter of LE HAVRE, who was offered in foal to CALANDAGAN’s sire GLENEAGLES. She was bought by Blandford Bloodstock for 155,000 guineas at the 2024 December Mares Sale and her illustrious sibling has since added four Group 1 victories to the page in the Japan Cup, the Champion Stakes, the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes and the Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud.
“That was terrifying!” laughed Overbury’s Simon Sweeting. “I am very lucky, I am on a wonderful farm that was laid down to grass a long time ago. Everything is as it should be, I have a fabulous team and they will do anything for the horses, and they do. I am hugely fortunate, we have got the right horses coming in and we have had some luck this summer.
“She came here a year ago as a wild card and we bought her then. There are few of us involved with her and it is a good team effort. When we were talking about her cover we had no intention of selling her originally, and Richard [Brown, Blandford Bloodstock] just said ‘let’s try and breed a racehorse’ and still until the King George we were not going to sell her, but things then stepped up and changed. And, of course, Sunday morning brought in a different group of people.”
Ace Stud’s Paul Curran commented: “What can you say of her? She has got a three-parts sibling in the belly and it makes a lot of sense after the weekend. In a way that win didn’t change anything, but it did put a different angle on him.
“She has a phenomenal pedigree, and there is commercially a very good horse to come from her no matter what it is. We are delighted to get her – we have no immediate plans for her. We will reassess, digest and sit down with everyone, and talk through plans.”
In addition to CALANDAGAN, CALIYZA is a half-sister to the Group placed three-year-old filly CALAMANDRA and was a talented racemare herself, achieving a Timeform rating of 91. The Aga Khan-bred siblings are from the excellent Lagardere family of French 2000 Guineas winner CLODOVIL.
The other two high profile purchases for Ace Stud were Sea the Stars mare Amazonian for 650,000 guineas and stakes-winning Earthlight mare Town and Country for 600,000 guineas.
Amazonian is a full sister high class stayer River of Stars, who was bought by Yulong at this sale last year for 1.65million guineas and she has since been second in the Group I MRC Caulfield Cup, third in the Sydney Cup as well as fourth in the Group I VRC Melbourne Cup.
