In this week's Rowe on Monday, Tim Rowe examines a different Magic Millions strategy for three West Australian studs, while he reveals how Kooringal Stud resident Sandbar, the sire of Randwick winner Shaggy, found his way to the Riverina farm.
New Perth view for old WA alliance
For the best part of a decade, Brent Atwell, Phil Ibbotson and Wayne Beynon have formed an alliance - the Western Breeders Alliance.
The principals of Darling View, Westbury Park and Einoncliff Park respectively, they’ve been working under the one umbrella each Magic Millions Perth Yearling Sale to sell their horses, but this year the trio has turfed their distinctive blue Western Breeders polo shirts in favour of reverting to operating under their own banners.
And there’s nothing sinister in the split, with the decision made effectively for logistical reasons.
It also points to the state of the farms and Western Australian racing and breeding in general with the reinvestment in stallions and broodmares.
While the national foal crop is declining, Western Australia’s foal crop has remained relatively stable, with 1226 mares served in 2024, making up 8t per cent of the national broodmare population.
Atwell has been one of the driving forces in riding the renewed interest in West Australian racing and breeding, securing Playing God when Mungrup Stud was sold as well as investing in Splintex and Lightsaber.
Trained by Mark Newnham in Sydney to win a Group 2 Arrowfield 3YO Sprint, a Bobbie Lewis as Flemington and a Group 3 Hall Mark Stakes, Splintex’s first yearlings will go through the Perth sale ring on Thursday and Friday this week, while Lightsaber’s first foals were born last year.
“I think if the three farms had to stay together, we were going to nominate somewhere in the vicinity of 70 or 75 horses (for the Perth sale),” Atwell said of the decision to disband the Western Breeders Alliance.
“So, it was a good opportunity for us, numbers-wise, as well as a great year with us offering the first of the Splintexes, to go out on our own.
“I guess the other interesting point, which got brought to my attention - I talk about it all the time and it just sort of hit my mind - but it's been 100 years since my great-grandfather owned and trained the Perth Cup winner, Great Applause. Whether it's a coincidence or good timing, I don’t know.”
Darling View has 28 yearlings catalogued in the two-book, 350-lot sale. Nine of them are by Playing God, the state’s premier sire, almost a quarter of the stallion’s yearlings catalogued at the sale.
Intriguingly, there are fewer Playing Gods catalogued in 2025 than there were in last year’s sale. This year’s crop were conceived on a service fee of $27,500 (inc GST), a then career-high for the stallion who stood for $49,500 last year.
“That year he covered 132 mares from memory and there's (high 30s) in the catalogue, so I had the conversation with David Houston (Magic Millions WA manager) early days and he said, ‘how many do you think we can get in the catalogue?’.
“And I told him, ‘well, if there's 60, put 60 in because everyone wants them in their stable. And in the end there was only 40-odd that were nominated. Talking to different breeders, and there's a few trainers that bred to Playing God as well, they obviously thought that it was a cheaper option than going to the sale (to buy one).”
Darling View has had a busy start to inspections, right from early last Friday when on-complex parades began, which is indicative of the level of interest in the sale as well as some outside factors with on-farm parades being less attended than they normally are.
“We'd had a really hot couple of weeks and the races got pushed and pulled here and there, with the transferring of meetings and so on, so a few of the general guys that would come out couldn't make it on-farm, so hence why I think (Friday) was quite busy for those guys,” Atwell said.
Ibbotson’s Westbury Park has 15 yearlings catalogued while Einoncliff Park has 11 set to go under the hammer.
Sandbar could have been in South America
Under different circumstances, Kooringal Stud-based stallion Sandbar - the sire of Saturday’s dominant Pierro Plate-winning two-year-old Shaggy - could have been half a world away to where he is now.
The 2018 Lonhro Plate and Rosebud winner, who was also placed in a Pago Pago and Roman Consul, stands at Kooringal Stud in the heart of the Riverina in Southern NSW.
The three-quarter-brother to Golden Slipper winner Farnan, Sandbar was retired from racing in 2021 after 21 starts. Unsurprisingly, the son of Snitzel was inspected by numerous bloodstock agents and studmasters who were considering him as a stallion prospect.
One of those expressing interest, via a bloodstock agent, was from South America and Argentina, to be exact.
For what was probably a myriad of reasons, nothing eventuated beyond the initial enquiries and an inspection by those representing the South Americans. It led to Kooringal’s Angus Lamont to pounce after Magic Millions’ Ben Culham was the studmaster’s eyes and ears while the entire was spelling in Queensland.
Sandbar’s son Shaggy rocketed into Golden Slipper calculations following his sustained display of speed at Randwick on Saturday, taking his record to three from three for Lamont and trainer Allan Kehoe.
And, as Lamont told colleague Warwick Barr last week, it’s not just Shaggy who has trainers’ tongues wagging.
Warwick Barr
Shaggy was scratched from the official Sydney two-year-old barrier trial heats last September and so was the Kooringal-owned Elasand, who is trained at Goulburn by Danny Williams.
Another Kooringal homebred, a filly named Lookacrossthewater, also trialled in September, underscoring the stallion’s ability to sire mature horses from a crop of just 40 live foals.
