Cover image courtesy of Inglis
As the days until the Inglis Classic Yearling Sale continue to dwindle, anticipation around one of the most varied sales on the calendar continues to build.
Ahead of selling commencing, The Thoroughbred Report caught up with Sebastian Hutch, to discuss the upcoming sale and the continued investment in lucrative bonuses for graduates of the Riverside complex.
‘Busy’ inspection days bolster confidence
“It's felt busy since horses started parading on Monday, and it's felt like there’s been good action right the way through,” Hutch said on Friday.
“Certainly, our feeling in advance of the sale over the last few weeks, and really the last few months since the catalogue was released, is that there's good engagement with the catalogue.
Gallery: Inspections are well underway at the Riverside complex, images courtesy of Inglis
“We want to try, and it's always an important objective for us, to put together a well-diversified catalogue in terms of stallions, pedigrees, and vendors that we can. Our experience is that's our best route to engaging the broadest volume of buyers, and it feels like, to this point anyway, there's lots of (interest) in the sale.
“It's another matter for it to manifest itself as bidding activity on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.
“This (diversity) was the easiest metric, it’s a bunch of different vendors and lots of different stallions, the sale is very much a sale that we feel has the capacity to cater for every facet of the market.
“Maybe traditionally, it was seen exclusively as a value sale. There might have been a perception that there wasn't the necessary depth of quality to attract buyers at the top of the market, but I think as the sales evolved, that's no longer the case.
“Maybe traditionally, it was seen exclusively as a value sale. There might have been a perception that there wasn't the necessary depth of quality to attract buyers at the top of the market, but I think as the sales evolved, that's no longer the case.” - Sebastian Hutch
“I think people recognize that they can come here and consistently find top class yearlings. That's demonstrated on the racecourse by the staples of the sale, which are trainers, syndicators, traders.
“There'll be people looking for nice fillies here and prepared to spend well on nice fillies. There'll be people here looking for colts. It's great to see the representatives, all the major colt syndicates get here.
“If we've done our job properly, people find what they want here, and hopefully we can send vendors and buyers home happy.”
“If we've done our job properly, people find what they want here, and hopefully we can send vendors and buyers home happy.” - Sebastian Hutch
Alterations to the catalogue, including the removal of the highway session, makes point-in-time comparison of key metrics a bit more complicated, according to Hutch.
“The average is going to fall just because the breakup of the sale has changed. There's no highway session. So year on year comparisons until the end of the sale will be very difficult because, traditionally, those horses that sold in the highway session with the end of the sale, and were compared independently of Book 1.
“There will be highway-type horses interspersed through the whole catalogue this year, which will just distort the metrics a bit.
“I think ultimately, we're looking at the sale, and we're trying to deliver two things. We want to generate good turnover, as well as good clearance.
“I think ultimately, we're looking at the sale, and we're trying to deliver two things. We want to generate good turnover, as well as good clearance.”- Sebastian Hutch
“Clearance through the ring has been softer than expected. The first couple of yearling sales so far this year, they've rounded out to be good sales, but just clearance through the ring wasn't what people might have been used to in past years.
“We'll be looking to do the best that we can in respect to that, I certainly get the feeling that vendors are much in tune with the selectivity that's in the market or evident in the market and looking to try and meet the market.”
When asked if there was a dream headline for Hutch at the conclusion of selling on Tuesday, he said, “Vendors going home happy.
“Beyond any particular metric, I mean obviously internally there are things that we talk about as being important.
“But if vendors can go home happy that we've done our part. We don't set the market, we facilitate it. I feel like we've worked hard to try and ensure that we're facilitating a healthy market on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, and hopefully that transpires to be the case.”
Bonuses give buyers millions of reasons to be active
One trend in recent years has been a rapid surge in prizemoney, both purely in advertised stakes, as well as bonuses and incentives.
Inglis have tinkered with their format for graduate-restricted races in recent years, with one of their most coveted, the R. Listed Inglis Millennium, set to be run tomorrow.
With the riches showing no sign of slowing down, and a new incentive program coming for Inglis graduates in the next racing season as well.
Learning To Fly, winner of the 2023 R. Listed Inglis Millennium | Image courtesy of Ashlea Brennan
“We've had an evolution of the race series over the last number of years. A few years ago, we added the pink bonus, which was really an initiative that we felt was suitable to cater for an increasing demographic of interest in our market.
“So, if you buy a yearling and the horse is registered as 75 per cent or more female-owned, they are eligible to be part of the pink bonus.
“We have four runners in the Millennium on Saturday that are pink bonus eligible. There’s some fantastic stories behind those horses, and it's been a great addition to our race series in terms of promoting horse ownership.
“We have four runners in the Millennium on Saturday that are pink bonus eligible. There’s some fantastic stories behind those horses, and it's been a great addition to our race series in terms of promoting horse ownership.” - Sebastian Hutch
“We've had Yvonne Sampson on as a pink bonus ambassador last year and joining in this year. She's told some great stories about female horse ownership, if that's a feature of the market and we continue to grow, that'd be great.
“The Xtra bonus was a new addition last year. Now a $100,000 bonus is added to 50 3-year-old maidens for the 2024/25 season.
“Obviously, nobody's been in a vision to win any of those bonuses yet. It's a feature of the scheme, so we are going to reward horses that are maidens going through their 3-year-old season, of which there are plenty.
Beer Baron, winner of the $200,000 Inglis Pink Bonus for being the first eligible horse home in the Inglis Nursery | Image courtesy of Inglis
“But the response we had to that was really excellent, and I think it's going to be exciting for people from the first of August next year, with the majority of races to be run in New South Wales and Victoria, but there's a plan to run a couple of races in Queensland and run a race in South Australia for people in those states to win what will be a massive bonus on top of the traditional prize associated with a maiden.
“We wanted to have a scheme that really shifted the dial in terms of prizemoney, and the response to it has just been really excellent. It'll be exciting to get that up and going.
“We look forward to releasing details of the race schedule for the extra later on in the year once we've managed to confirm those with the PRAs, but I think that's another important incentive. Ultimately, we want to try and ensure that we're contributing to incentivizing racehorse ownership.”
