Too Darn Hot gets major fee hike as Darley introduces four new faces

Darley’s 2024 Australian roster will see four new stallions added, but it is the bullish pricing on young stallion Too Darn Hot, whose fee has jumped from $44,000 to $110,000, which catches the eye.

Too Darn Hot, the multiple Group 1-winning son of Dubawi, secured his first Australian Group 1 winner last Saturday when Broadsiding won the Champagne Stakes at Randwick. He has eight winners from his first Australian crop and leads the race to be crowned Australia’s champion first-season sire.

However, such a significant fee rise, from $44,000 to $110,000 will take the market by surprise. The speculation ahead of stallion announcements was that service fee rises, even for boom stallions, would be moderated due to uncertainty in the commercial market.

However, Darley has backed in Too Darn Hot, who has made a considerable impression in the northern hemisphere as well with five stakes winners and 42 winners in total.

Outside of Too Darn Hot, the only other Darley stallion to get a fee rise was another shuttler, Harry Angel, who jumps from $33,000 to $38,500 off the back of Tom Kitten’s win in last year’s Spring Champion Stakes.

The four new faces on the roster include two locally bred colts, Newmarket Handicap winner Cylinder, who opens at $44,000, and Caulfield Guineas victor Golden Mile ($16,500). Both of those young stallions will stand at Northwood Park in Victoria.

Native Trail, the champion European two-year-old son of Oasis Dream who went on to win the Irish 2000 Guineas, visits Kelvinside in NSW in 2024 at a fee of $27,500 and will be joined on the plane by Queen Anne Stakes winner Triple Time, a son of Frankel who will stand for $22,000.

Cylinder winning the Newmarket Handicap. — *Newmarket Handicap winner Cylinder will be among four new faces on the Darley stallion roster at an opening fee of $44,000. (Photo: Scott Barbour/Getty Images)*

With Exceed And Excel now pensioned, the Darley roster is topped by Anamoe, who stays at the $121,000 he stood at in his first season. His first book of 148 mares included 11 Group 1 winners, 69 stakeswinners as well as the dams of Joliestar, King’s Legacy, Private Eye and Bivouac.

Speaking of Bivouac, his fee has moderated ahead of his first crop hitting the track, to $55,000 from $66,000, while Pinatubo remains unchanged at that same fee.

Rounding out the Kelvinside roster are Microphone at $22,000 (down from $33,000), Astern at $16,500 (down from $22,000) and Victor Ludorum at $13,750 (down from $16,500).

Anamoe’s sire Street Boss leads the Victorian roster at $66,000, an unchanged fee, while Blue Point, whose first crop are currently two-year-olds, is also steady at $44,000. Brazen Beau has had a fee cut, from $44,000 to $33,000, while Ghaiyyath remains unchanged ahead of his first crop hitting the track in 2024/25.