Newmarket's super sire Frankel’s colt hits top note for Lloyd Webbers at Tattersalls

Newmarket super stallion Frankel, who was a sensation on the racecourse, is now proving to be a superior sire and his star continued to rise at the record-breaking Tattersalls premier yearling sale when five of the top 10 prices paid for yearlings at the three-day sale were for his progeny.

And they included the highest priced yearling in the world this year, a 2.8 million guinea colt out of So Mi Dar sold by Lord and Lady Lloyd Webber’s Watership Down Stud to agent Anthony Stroud on behalf of Sheikh Mohammed’s Godolphin racing organisation.

Madeleine Lloyd Webber, who was at Park Paddocks to see the colt sold, was obviously delighted.

“It is always a shame to sell the wonderful stock out of the Dar Re Mi family but we just have to,” she said. “We are delighted that Godolphin bought him and he is going to stay here and be trained brilliantly. We could not have hoped for anything better really.”

Frankel, who stands at Cheveley’s Banstead Manor Stud, has had a remarkable year, even by his high standards, with eight individual group/grade 1 winners, including Alpinista, winner of the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe just days before the start of Book 1 of the October Yearling Sale.

He has also passed 100 individual group and listed winners and 50 individual group winners quicker than any other stallion in history. And on Wednesday, just a few lots after the record breaker, another Frankel colt saw the sale ring price indicator board flicker to 2.4 million guineas, M V Magnier the successful buyer.

Turnover for the three-day sale was a record 126,671,000 guineas, up a massive 47 per cent on last year’s sale, while the average and median rose by 30 per cent and 25 per cent respectively to 298,752 guineas and 200,000 guineas, both records.

“This has been an extraordinary yearling sale,” said Tattersalls chairman Edmond Mahony. “When the first two lots through the ring on Tuesday morning made 500,000 guineas and 1,300,000 guineas, the stage was set and the pace has been unrelenting from that moment on.

“Book 1 of the Tattersalls October Yearling Sale annually showcases the very best yearlings to be found in Europe, and even by the lofty standards of this special sale we felt that this year’s catalogue was out of the ordinary. Nevertheless we could not have predicted the extraordinary level of trade we experienced over the three days.”