‘I’d do it again in a heartbeat’ – Harvey stands by Debutant gamble with $500,000 Zoustar filly

Trainer Troy Corstens and Harvey gambled on the Zoustar filly, who was touted as a potential sale-topper ahead of the two-year-old sale, being able to win the Listed race on the middle day of the Caulfield carnival.

She started the $3.80 favourite but finished sixth, beaten 3.4 lengths behind the winner Torture, a performance that arguably wiped hundreds of thousands of dollars off Rachini’s value.

Rachini was offered in absentia on Thursday, with agent Jim Clarke buying the filly for $500,000 on behalf of Warwick Farm trainer Bjorn Baker.

Harvey and Corstens, who sold a Written Tycoon filly Signature Scent for $1 million at last year’s Ready2Race Sale, paid $200,000 for her from China Horse Club’s The Chase at the Magic Millions in January.

“I’d do it again in a heartbeat. We knew she was a good filly and sometimes on their first day of the races, things don’t go to plan,” Harvey told The Straight.

“She was on a really hard track and I thought she was probably entitled to drop out at the 200 after getting lost midway, but she knuckled down again and finished off quite nicely.”

Rachini had two jumpouts and a breeze-up at Wangaratta all in the past month, a busy preparation for an early-season juvenile.

“So, it tested her constitution. I think she did really well, but she was just very new yesterday,” Harvey said.

“She’s a filly going places and I’ve got no doubt she’ll be a stakes winner in waiting. I hate letting those ones go, but I’ve got to pay the bills. 

“I’m sure they’ll get a result and maybe buy another one from us next year.”

Clarke, who had Rachini inspected by fellow agent Damon Gabbedy at Corstens’ Flemington stable on Thursday morning, believes the filly represented value.

“There’s no doubt with her pedigree and her physique, if she had got the job done (on Wednesday), then it would have been a different price tag altogether and we wouldn’t have been able to buy her,” Brisbane-based Clarke said. 

“So, I guess it was a matter of figuring out where we saw value in her. I think at $500,000, given she’s by the champion sire with a huge pedigree and has performed credibly in a stakes race at her first start, I thought she was pretty good value in the market.”

Rachini will be given an extended spell before joining Baker’s stable later in the season.

“She won’t be rushing back for any of the earlier races or anything like that,” Clarke said. 

“I think she’ll have a well-earned time in the paddock and then come back as an autumn two-year-old and I expect she’ll be at her best as a three-year-old.”

Hermitage Thoroughbreds, which raced champion three-year-old The Autumn Sun, heavily invested in a number of two-year-olds at the Ready2Race catalogue, headed by a $900,000 colt by Toronado and a $675,000 I Am Invincible colt.

Lot 89 RACHINI (Zoustar x Ordos Honor) – who debuted with a close-up 5th in yesterday's Listed Debutant Stakes @MelbRacingClub – sells for $500k from @BaystoneFarm's draft! Congratulations to buyer @ClarkeBstock. The filly was sold in absentia. #InglisReady2Race pic.twitter.com/yqWDctaOYz

— Inglis (@inglis_sales) October 16, 2025

With the support of agent Guy Mulcaster, who also bought The Autumn Sun for the Hong Kong owner, Hermitage’s Eugene Chuang also paid $550,000 for a son of Toronado, $280,000 for a Farnan colt and $160,000 for a Fastnet Rock juvenile.

He also paid $20,000 for a bargain Satono Aladdin colt.

Chuang is in Sydney for The Everest where Hermitage Thoroughbreds and Arrowfield Stud have Lady Shenandoah running in the slot owned by Fairway Thoroughbreds’ John Camilleri.

“The family came down as a group and we’re privileged enough to be able to buy them half a dozen pretty nice horses,” Mulcaster told The Straight.

“(Chuang) really liked the ones we picked out for him and he hopped in and got involved.”

The sale-topping Toronado colt, who is the first foal of Group 3 winner Baccarat Baby, was a $250,000 pinhook for Liam Ruddy and Hunter Lodge out of the Inglis Easter sale.

“To me, he was a lovely athletic horse that looked like he’d furnish in another six months,” Mulcaster said.

“I know he breezed up in a wonderful time, but physically he looked like he had a fair bit to come and go on.”

The second highest-priced of Hermitage’s haul, the I Am Invincible colt, was a $375,000 Easter purchase by Kuta Bloodstock from breeder and vendor Emirates Park who raced his sister, stakes-winning two-year-old Ebhaar.

The two-year-old was prepared by Victorian trainer Liam Howley from his Kyneton base and consigned by Mitch Pearce’s Crossley Thoroughbreds.

Overall, the sale’s gross reached $19,054,000, eclipsing the previous record by more than $2.3 million.

In total, 64 lots realised $100,000 or more (up from 50 last year) while 39 sold for $200,000 or more (up from 28 in 2024), leading to a strong breeze up sale clearance rate of 75 per cent.

“We felt before the sale that we were better prepared than ever before, in terms of our work with both vendors and buyers, which in turn bred a level of confidence that the sale would go well,’’ Inglis Bloodstock CEO Sebastian Hutch said.

2025 INGLIS READY2RACE SALE (2024 stats in brackets)

Sold: 122 (95)

Clearance: 75% (64%)

Average: $156,180 ($164,289)

Median: $100,000 ($100,000)

Gross: $19,054,000 ($15,607,000)