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Trainer goes to $600,000 for Zoustar half-sister to Tycoon Humma
Redgum Racing’s John McArdle found himself in familiar territory on Sunday, as he went to $600,000 to secure a filly by Zoustar (Northern Meteor) from a family he knows well.
Catalogued as Lot 87 and offered by Flinders Park Stud, the filly is the sixth foal out of Humma Mumma (Bel Esprit), making her a half-sister to last year’s Proud Miss Stakes (Gr 3, 1200m) winner Humma Humma (Denman) and Saturday’s unbeaten Very Special Kids Plate (registered as Festival Of Racing Stakes) (Listed, 1000m) winner Tycoon Humma (Capitalist).
McArdle’s Redgum Racing purchased both Humma Humma and Tycoon Humma at previous editions of the Melbourne Sale, with the trainer parting with $80,000 for Humma Humma in 2017, while he bought Tycoon Humma for $240,000 at last year’s sale.
Given his long association with the family, McArdle said everyone knew he would have been keen to secure the well-related filly.
“Yesterday’s result probably cost me a bit more money today but the prize-money helped go towards this one too I suppose,’’ McArdle said.
“This filly, she’s just spectacular. I saw her as a foal, I saw her on the farm, I saw her a fair few times here this past week, it was probably the worst kept secret in the world that I wanted to buy her and I’m more than happy to secure her now and get her home.”
Of the Premier Sale, the trainer commented: “This sale, it just keeps improving. I’ve been coming here a long time and the vendors are just producing better and better-quality horses and people can come here and buy with confidence.’’
Flinders Park Stud also sold an Impending (Lonhro) filly for $85,000 on day of the sale and given the timely update Mick Cumming said he had expected the Zoustar filly to garner lots of admirers in the sales ring.
“We were expecting a fair bit of money for her, many leading judges had told me she was a half-million dollar filly so to get $600,000, it’s a fantastic result,” he said.
“She was so popular, she was legitimately out 40 times per day, every day, since she’s been here, we had over 30 X-Ray hits on her and generally you’re happy if you’re getting half a dozen X-Ray hits on a horse.”
Humma Mumma was herself offered by Flinders Park Stud at the 2007 Premier Sale but passed in for $37,500. She has now had five of her progeny sold at the sale with Redgum Racing buying them all for a total outlay of $1,140,000. The first was Strela (Smart Missile) who cost $120,000 and won twice at two and in addition to Humma Humma, Tycoon Humma and the Zoustar filly, McArdle bought Hummalong (Hallowed Crown) three years ago for $100,000. After missing to Brazen Beau (I Am Invincible) in 2019 Humma Mumma was covered last November by Blue Point (Shamardal).
Cumming also said he felt the quality of the Premier Sale has improved over the past few years.
“I’ve been coming to this sale for 30 years and it’s definitely changed regarding the quality of ‘horse flesh that comes here, there’s a lot of nice horses here and once word gets out that there’s a lot of nice horses at a sale, everyone wants to attend and it certainly has been that case here this week.’’