In this week’s Rowe on Monday, Tim Rowe catches up with ambitious owner Paul Lofitis after Lofty Arch’s win on Saturday, puts the microscope on early success for first-season sires and reveals a likely switch of stables in of the two major Australian sales companies.
Lofitis’ Lofty ambition for Snitzel colt as lightning strikes twice
For 40 years, as Paul Lofitis went about literally building his fortune through property development, he put his passion for racing to one side.
Then, six years ago, with a succession plan in place that allowed his children to take over the family business, Lofitis took a step back and retired from the day-to-day rigours of working life.
With a sudden amount of free time and financially rewarded for his decades of hard work, Lofitis made the decision to pursue his racing dreams.
And in a relatively short space of time Lofitis had Lofty Strike come along, winning the Group 2 Rubiton and twice finishing runner-up in Group 1 sprints, the Oakleigh Plate and Newmarket Handicap.
Despite falling agonisingly short of winning at the highest level, Lofty Strike achieved enough to retire to stud, taking up residence this season at Adam Sangster’s Swettenham Stud in Victoria.
Now, Lofitis has unearthed another highly talented son of Snitzel who bears an uncanny resemblance to Lofty Strike, the Alex Rae-trained Lofty Arch.
The eye-catching three-year-old, who has a big frame and an unmissable white blaze, made it two wins from three starts in the Listed Gothic Stakes at Caulfield on Saturday, downing some highly touted colts in the process.
Lofty Arch (left) as a yearling and Lofty Strike (right) as a yearling.
Rae, Lofitis and the colt’s fellow owners now face a conundrum. Do they run Lofty Arch in the Group 1 Coolmore on Derby Day at Flemington or bide their time and wait for the autumn with the lightly raced colt still in his first racing preparation?
It’s a nice problem to have.
“The aim is to obviously try to win a Group 1, but we're not going to rush him,” Lofitis says.
“I'm guided, of course, by the trainer. Alex is going to look at him in the next maybe two or three days.
“He'll report back to me because I'm up in Byron Bay for the next seven days and we'll have a chat. There won't be any decision made until I come back to Melbourne.”
Lofty Strike, who was trained by Julius Sandhu and ran fourth in the 2022 edition of the Coolmore, was the catalyst for Lofty Arch also coming under the Lofty Thoroughbreds umbrella.
Lofitis paid $200,000 for the half-brother to the stakes-placed juvenile See You Soon, who was bred by Frenchman Jean Dubois of Woodpark Stud in the New South Wales Southern Highlands, at the 2023 Inglis Easter sale.
The price is not small change, but it was also not much more than Snitzel’s 2020 service fee of $165,000.
While other buyers overlooked the colt, who was consigned by Twin Hills Stud, Lofitis was immediately taken by the colt’s presence, I guess you could say.
“He reminded me of him (Lofty Strike) and I thought, ‘you know what, lightning may strike twice’. He looked the goods as a yearling,” Lofitis recalled.
“He had some issues early because we sort of maybe pushed him a bit too hard as a two-year-old, and that's why he didn't run as a two-year-old, but he's come back now as a three-year-old as strong as ever.
“He's a bit heavy and we've got to be careful with his weight, but he's OK. He's sound, so we're very happy.”
Lofitis currently has 17 horses in training, including the Capitalist half-brother to champion $6.6 million mare Imperatriz.
Also prepared by Rae, the two-year-old colt also cost a neat $200,000 and the early signs are promising, based on his trainer’s feedback and on what Lofitis has witnessed himself.
“He's a bit heavy and we've got to be careful with his weight, but he's OK. He's sound, so we're very happy.” - Paul Lofitis
The retired businessman is a hands-on owner, regularly spending time at the stables of his resident trainers, Rae and Sandhu and soon-to-be Anthony and Sam Freedman.
When he decided to buy horses, Lofitis also wanted his own place from where they would be trained from, so he purchased a nine-acre block adjacent to the Cranbourne Training Centre that was formerly owned by trainer Mick Kent.
He has since developed it into a multi-tenanted stable complex, the latest investment to house the Freedmans who have chosen to relocate their Flemington stable to Cranbourne.
“Apart from the fact that we've been building stables, I'm always there (anyway) as I like to see the horses regularly and, obviously, the vets come in daily,” he said of his trackwork attendance.
First season sires’ winning run continues
It’s effectively not even a month into the season for two-year-old racing and already four first season sires are off the mark.
Newhaven Park’s Cool Aza Beel, whose juveniles have shown promise in barrier trials and races in recent weeks on both sides of the Tasman, had daughter Cool Aza Rene score on debut at Otaki on Saturday for Te Akau, the outfit which of course trained the Karaka Million winner.
Cool Aza Rene was a class above today under Craig Grylls and wins on debut in 2YO company 👏#BigSaturday pic.twitter.com/7KUizkgwBF
— Trackside NZ (@TracksideNZ) October 19, 2024
Not to be outdone, Widden’s Doubtland had colt Leave No Doubt win his first start at Bendigo for trainers Tony and Calvin McEvoy in the colours of prominent owner Noel Greenhalgh.
In doing so, Leave No Doubt defeated Hello Romeo, a colt by Cambridge Stud’s first season shuttler Hello Youmzain.
Bred by Widden and bought by the McEvoys and Damon Gabbedy’s Belmont Bloodstock Agency, Leave No Doubt is the stable’s second juvenile winner so far this season.
Interestingly, Leave No Doubt is by a son of the late sire Not Single Doubt out of a mare by Your Song, himself a son of Fastnet Rock.
From a small sample size, the Not Single Doubt-Fastnet Rock cross has produced four runners for three winners including Snapped, a dual stakes winner in Adelaide.
Vinery’s Ole Kirk, who sired the winner of the Breeders’ Plate and Gimcrack Stakes runner-up, and Yulong’s Lucky Vega have also sired Australasian winners in 2024-25.
New recruit for Inglis?
If the whispers are to be believed, it appears that Inglis has pulled off a recruiting coup, luring a well-respected industry figure to Sydney to replace Asia representative Jin Tian who left the auction house in March.
All is set to be revealed in the coming days, but in the world of thoroughbred auction houses, it’s not uncommon for people to switch camps to further their career, particularly between arch-rivals Magic Millions and Inglis.
Vin Cox, Tony “Tubba” Williams, Barry Bowditch and Chris Russell are among those to have worked for both outfits.
And, just for the record, it’s not veteran David Chester who is switching camps.
Tian, meanwhile, was spotted at the Inglis Ready2Race Sale last week in his new role with the Hong Kong Jockey Club.
