I got
up at 5am yesterday and drove our lorry up to Newmarket sales full of excitement and hope
that it would be coming back full! I had
two good orders – one from a past owner who was with me the day I started
training and who I used to ride for and another was for a new client.
There
were two horses that I had my eye on and I had done plenty of homework on too –
I’d also been to see them at their yard before the sales. They looked and felt
super, were not over trained or crippled as I often see when buying horses off
the flat as a lot of them are trained and run too early. I had them both vetted at the sales and they
passed with flying colours. I started to
get nervous! I was hoping we would get
the first horse for between 20-30,000gns but it went for 45,000gns! I think he goes to the Middle
East so we are unlikely to see him again – let’s hope he gets
looked after well as he was a lovely, good looking horse with a great, honest
attitude. The second horse had rather thrown in the towel and had lost his form
and personally needed sweetening up. We
were hoping to get him for under £5,000 but he went to Gordon Elliott for
15,000gns! It will be interesting to see
how he gets on and how I will feel when he lines up at Cheltenham
after winning a few!
There
was a lot of foreign money at the sales pushing the prices up – as so often
happens at Newmarket
– but we will keep looking. Sadly I came
home late last night with an empty box but on the upside I had a great
afternoon enjoying the racing at Newmarket,
with some new friends. It is important
to try and get value for money for my owners.
