September was when I really go into overdrive with yearling sales taking-up much of the time. I went out to the massive Keeneland September Yearling sale in plenty of time to ensure I didn’t get behind schedule. I was lucky that Federico Barberini was able to help me sift through the enormous amount of yearlings as I may not have been able to do such a thorough job without him. Fawzi Nass, the owner of Aislabie Stud which I manage, was keen to buy and ended up buying 2 lovely fillies and a colt from the select Book 1 – these included a quality First Samurai half-sister to 2010 Gr.2 winning 2yo Laughing Lashes and a lovely Distorted Humor filly out of a half-sister to Ishiguru. Fawzi bought to other cheaper yearlings and a client of Marcus Tregoning’s bought a very racy Dixie Union filly out of a half-sister to Diffident.
I returned straight from Keeneland to go to Goffs Orby Sale at which I looked at plenty but bought nothing.
I’m looking forward to October with both excitement and trepidation as it is one of the most full-on months of my year with sales virtually every day. I have a few more yearlings to hopefully buy, though nothing very expensive, and then there is the Tattersalls Horses-In-Training sale which I normally buy quite a few at. It is also a time of year to start thinking about booking a few stallion nominations before stallions get full.