Thecoffeepoddotco
The Coffee Pod Dot Co
Purchased at the Tattersalls Somerville Yearling Sale
In any given sale, there are around 15-20 nice horses, and usually half a dozen, or so, really nice horses and price tag you have to pay for each depends on market interest in any given horse. The ultimate deter-mining factors of the hammer price are fashion, black type pedigree and levels of interest. A fashionable pedigree will garner huge levels of interest e.g. if by a sexy, current stallion, and/or whether the mare has produced, or hails from a black type laden family, then, add into the mix where the horse sits in the “nice, or very nice horse” or “otherwise” pecking order. You can often see, in any sale results for yearlings/unraced horses, a remarkably well bred individual, sell for peanuts and the explanation is where the sits in nice horse pecking order; presumably low down.
If you are prepared to forgo fashion, forgo overt black type in the pedigree, and hone in, primarily, on the horse itself, we find, we can often unearth a real gem of a horse, for a very sensible purchase price. That’s precisely what we’ve done here. In talking the catalogue through, with Richard Hannon and ace Bloodstock agent Ross Doyle, there were many horses they liked, as did we, but as the saying goes, “you can’t buy them all”, so we decided to narrow it down. We asked Richard, to put to us, his two naps of the sale, for which, he duly obliged - “She’s not got much page, but she’s an absolute smasher” were Richard’s words about lot 201, this daughter of Whitsbury Manor Stud's first season sire SERGEI PROKOFIEV.
.
Based on the stallion phenomenon’s that are SHOWCASING & HAVANA GREY (both Whitsbury Manor Stud sires), Whitsbury’s, latest, freshmen sire incumbent, SERGEI PROKOFIEV - son of the great Scat Daddy - has met with serious appeal, across the racing industry, as his progeny are presented for sale. His offspring are ALL ‘of a type’, a “good size, good walking, speedy looking 2yo for 2024”. Nobody can seri-ously claim to be able to judge which freshman/first season sire will make the grade, however, we’ve been pretty accurate in such predictions, most notably Dark Angel, back in the day, and latterly, Havana Grey. Havana Grey looks like he’s the most exciting new sire out there, very possibly an ‘elite sire’ in the making. Sergei Prokofiev could easily be the next in line, we’d suggest!
At MPR, we’ve done pretty well with such sons and daughters of first season sires; we loaded up with Ha-vana Grey two years ago - Eddie’s Boy, Cuban Mistress, Maylandsea. A few moons ago we bought the very first ‘good’ Dark Angel in Lily’s Angel and it’s fair to say that progeny of a very successful first season sire, can look exceptional value 12 months down the line.
She’s a proper, old school, Richard Hannon Snr sort of horse, with lots of strength, but above all real quality in appearance and an effortless, fluid stride. Yes, we’ve sacrificed fashion, the sire has yet to have a runner and the mare has produced one horse so far, currently rated 75 by Time Test (raced 3 times to date), how-ever we can honestly say, we saw no finer individual, all week, from the 314 lots catalogued at Newmarket’s Park Paddocks. She’s the sort of horse that the Hannon’s have built their empire upon. To use the words “nap of the week” would be a little strong, there were individuals who had a little more fashion or pedigree about them, but we’d have her right up there with ANY other, in the horse as an individual Stakes. Please don’t just take just our word for it, Richard Hannon had her right near the top of his tree too, lest we forget. Ironically, and for all we know, we may actually be buying into a very sexy, very fashionable stallion in a year’s time and who knows what the 2yo brother by Time Test, will go on to do? It’s possible that fashion and pedigree are already in there, merely covertly.
She’s come in on a very sensible budget at 42,000gns, as predicted, we never felt we’d have to pay the earth for her. Her price tag is around that which we thought we’d have to pay. It could look very good value should Sergei Prokofiev take off, à la Whitsbury’s, SHOWCASING or HAVANA GREY. We specifically asked Richard and Ross, “does she look, to you, like a Windsor in April and hopefully onwards and upwards thereafter sort?” Categorically, in tandem, they replied - “Yes”
She’s probably a perfect candidate too, for next year’s £100,000 & £150,000 6f Newmarket Sales races, for which graduates of this sale, along with those of Book 3, exclusively qualify. Her dam was a fast, 5f-7f horse in her racing days for Richard Hannon, her sire was exclusively 5f-6f, so she has all the pedigree at-tributes to be a very speedy sort, ideal for the challenges of those 6f Newmarket races next August and Oc-tober respectively.
She comes in, on qualification budget for the £300,000 Newbury Weatherbys Super Sprint - Tiggy Wiggy won it for Richard Hannon off £41,000 and we won it in 2022 with Eddie’s Boy (£45,000), so she’s in great company. In addition, she’ll be suited to a race like the Listed Redcar 2yo Trophy given her sire’s sensible Median Price tag - it’s a race where the weight you carry is determined by the median price of your sire - the more fashionable your sire, the more weight you carry. She’s a contender, at this stage, on paper, at least.
Furthermore, she’s 100% 'GBB Bonus' qualified, meaning she can win can win up to £20,000 in bonus prize money per eligible race.
Training update (2nd November): Richard is very pleased with her since she arrived at his Herridge Stables, from pre training last week. If you are interested in taking a share in her and would like to see her, please join us at our owners visit to Richard's stables, on Saturday 9th December. Email sarah@middlehamparkracing.net to book your place!
At pre training, in October, they reported: "She is getting on well - hacking up the AWT along with going in the arena. She is a great ride and has taken everything in her stride."
