Vibrant and successful 36 years comes to a close at the Magic Millions National Sale

When the hammer falls on Lot 839 at the Magic Millions National Broodmare Sale next Tuesday, it will bring to a close a very successful and lucrative 36 years for Shadwell Stud in Australia. 

It was announced earlier in the year the operation would disband it’s Australian holdings and this was then followed by the untimely death of Shawell’s owner Hamdan bin Rashid Al Maktoum in March. 

Shadwell’s famous silks have been a familiar sight on Australian racetracks for decades, most notably through the exploits of champions such as Melbourne Cup (Gr 1, 3200m)-winning pair At Talaq (Roberto) and Jeune (Kalaglow), as well as Group 1-winning champions Almaarad (Ela-Mana-Mou) and Zabeel (Sir Tristram). 

Shadwell’s racing manager Angus Gold told Racing and Sports Bloodstock that it would be a sad day for him personally when the 60 lots are sold during the National Sale, which gets underway on Thursday. 

“It is incredibly sad from a personal point of view, but nothing lasts forever and we've been very lucky to be involved in Australia for so long,” said Gold. “I've been very lucky that Sheikh Hamdan was prepared to support the industry down there to the extent he did considering that he was never, other than once, able to get there. Everyone knows he was a man who was very hands-on and loved being involved in all aspects, particularly matings. He was very kind and he pretty much left it up to me alongside the Mitchells to come up with the suggestions for the matings and obviously to the Hayes family with regards to the horses in training.”

Shadwell raced their horses exclusively with the Hayes family since arriving in Australia all those years ago and their breeding stock was left under the tutelage of Yarraman Park’s Arthur and Harry Mitchell, who will offer the stock on behalf of Shadwell at the Magic Millions sale. 

The operation’s success in the country was almost instant, but in terms of highlight achievements, Gold earmarks Jeune’s 1994 Melbourne Cup victory as the real standout among the impressive roll of honour and he was only acquired by Shadwell after a chance phone call 12 months before his famous win in the iconic race. 

“There were so many highlights, but I would have to put Juene winning the Melbourne Cup as one of the proudest achievements,” Gold recalls. “He was trained in England by Geoff Wragg and was high-class. 

“Interestingly, we only came by him because John Dunlop rang me up as I was driving to the airport to fly to Melbourne the year before he won the Cup, and asked if the horse would be of any interest because the McAlpines who he trained for bred and owned the horse and they wanted to sell him. He'd already failed a couple of vets and I thought at first Sheikh Hamdan might want him for Dubai. 

“I remember ringing him and he said straight away: That is the horse for Australia if he passes the vet. So we had him vetted and he passed and we bought him for relatively very little money.”

Sheikh Hamdan’s instincts proved to be right and Jeune turned out to be the perfect asset to Shadwell’s Australian team, winning the Underwood Stakes (Gr 1, 1800m) in September en route to his victory in the Flemington showpiece.   

“The following year, I arrived in Melbourne the morning of the race and we won the Melbourne Cup that afternoon, which is slightly the stuff of dreams,” Gold remembers. 

The horse’s success in the country did not stop there, he would also go on to land the CF Orr Stakes (Gr 1, 1400m) and Queen Elizabeth Stakes (Gr 1, 2000m) in 1995. 

A race that became somewhat synonymous with the famous blue and white silks was undoubtedly the Blue Diamond Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m), which Shadwell were successful in on three occasions, first in 1990 with Mahaasin, while they landed it for a second time in 2006 with Nadeem (Candide) and again two years later with Reaan (Hussonet). 

“The Blue Diamond wins were fantastic, but particularly with Nadeem purely because that was the first year back that Sheikh Hamdan had let me buy yearlings,” said Gold. “Prior to this we had got down to very few horses in Australia, partly because the ones we used to send out from Europe dried up because racing in Dubai started up and they ended up there instead.

“When David [Hayes] returned from Hong Kong, I spoke to him and said I would like to try and get some horses back - which was an idea he was very keen on. 

“I spoke to Sheikh Hamdan and he was a little reluctant initially, but then kindly gave me a budget to buy some horses in Sydney. We were underbidder on Miss Finland that same year, which again was a great shame because she was absolutely top-class, but at the same time we bought Nadeem who won the Blue Diamond - he sadly fractured a cannon bone and was never the same afterwards, but, he was a very good horse on his day.

“From then on he let me go buy horses and we were lucky. We came up with Reaan who won another Blue Diamond a few years later - so it was quite lucky for us.”

The broodmares set to be offered during the Magic Millions National Sale are a mixture of Shadwell homebreds as well as ones sourced by Gold as yearlings and he explained the influx of huge stallion syndicates purchasing the blue-chip colts for often astronomical prices made it harder for him to compete at the top-end, which has as a result has made their broodmare band stronger. 

“Over the last few years, I found it particularly difficult to buy the bigger colts at the sales. Sheikh Hamdan didn't give me a budget as such, but obviously I was trying to buy horses I liked without spending ridiculous money. 

“So once those big stallion buying syndicates and joined forces to buy colts with the likes of Spendthrift and Stonestreet coming in from America, and then obviously then Aquis and Yulong so it became very hard to compete for the bigger colts.”

One of the most successful purchases in recent times was Qafila, who Gold bought for $450,000 at the 2017 edition of the Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale from the Attunga Stud draft and she would subsequently go on to beat her male counterparts in the 2018 South Australian Derby (Gr 1, 2500m), having finished fourth in the South Australian Oaks (Gr 1, 2000m) only a week before. 

“Qafila was huge personally for me,” said Gold. “I love that filly, because the year we bought her I thought she was the most athletic filly I saw in the sale and she had plenty of class to go with it. I just loved her.

“She had the speed to win over 1000 metres, but basically she ended up as a mile and a half filly, and ended up winning the South Australian Derby, having been fourth in the Oaks the week before.”

The Golden Slipper Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m) is one race that has alluded Shadwell Australia and having been underbidder on the 2006 winner Miss Finland (Redoute’s Choice), Gold also just fell short when trying to purchase Estijaab (Snitzel), who eventually sold to Emirates Park and Bryan Carlson for $1.7 million at the Inglis Australian Easter Yearling Sale in 2017 and would go on to take out the Group 1 a year a later. 

“That was probably the worst sale we had in one way - I was underbidder on Estijaab and The Autumn Sun in successive days - that was a costly sale,” he explains. “Estijaab made a huge amount of money, but we gave it our best shot on, and to be honest The Autumn Sun, I was surprised he made as much as he did purely because he was out of a Galileo mare and I didn't think he was necessarily going to be a fast horse.”

Away from the horses, Gold says some of his most cherished memories from his time in the country were the strong lifelong friendships he forged, particularly with the Hayes and Mitchell family. 

“The people I met out there have been a massive part of the fun,” said Gold. “To me at the time it was a foreign country and it was venturing into a market I didn't know, so whoever you are, you need good people around you when you're setting foot for the first time with an operation in a foreign country. 

“The Hayes Family looked after us and Colin Hayes was like a father to me. He was a fantastic man in my life. He'd ring up once or twice a year and just check out how I was and we'd have a chat about life, let alone the horses. He taught me a lot early on, I arrived knowing absolutely nothing about Australian racing and I fell in love with it. 

“I loved working with Peter Hayes as well and when he was very sadly killed Tony McEvoy then took over and he is wonderful and became a great friend and still is. Then David came back from Hong Kong and we always got on very well. 

“I'd known the Mitchells before I started working at Shadwell, so to have that connection with them and for them to be such a professional team, and they've got a great team of people around them or have been very helpful to me. The continuity of working with the same people year after year was absolutely fantastic.

“For Shadwell and myself personally, we were very, very lucky that we were served so well by the two families and we owe them a huge debt of gratitude.”

Gold explains the vibrancy and buoyant nature of Australia and the excitement of winning big races will be something he will undoubtedly miss, but seeing the stock on the farm at Yarraman and track work in the mornings at Lindsay Park will be the aspect of the job he will be most sad to bid farewell to.  

“What I'll miss most is waking up to the pinging of my telephone in England when suddenly you get three or four pings in succession and it doesn't matter what time of the night it was, I just then we'd had a big winner. That was a massive excitement.

“But really for me, the enjoyable bit was going up to Yarraman Park and spending time on the stud and seeing all the young stock and talking to all the staff who looked after them and getting to know the horses a little bit. 

“Those times on the farm and watching the track work in the morning, those were the real enjoyments for me personally.”