In his weekly bloodstock column, Tim Rowe talks to Joe Pride about risky x-rays and Group 1 glory with new Group One stable star Ceolwulf.
Joe Pride finished sixth on the Sydney trainers’ premiership last season, preparing 46 city winners, equal with his Warwick Farm-based peer Bjorn Baker.
Helped by his one-three Everest finish with Think About It and Private Eye, Pride’s stable also banked $19.23 million in NSW prize money in 2023-24, bettered by only Chris Waller, Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott and Ciaron Maher.
Think About It ($70,000) and Private Eye ($62,500), both purchased in partnership with Jamie Walter’s Proven Thoroughbreds, cost a relative pittance compared to what the average sale price of the yearlings which enter many of the biggest Sydney stables and, again on Saturday, Pride’s Group 1 Epsom Handicap winner Ceolwulf demonstrated the trainer’s eye for value.
Pride, who confirmed Ceolwulf will have his next start in the $5 million King Charles on Everest day, has to compromise when it comes to acquiring horses. He rarely spends more than $250,000 and shelled out $170,000 for Ceolwulf at the 2022 New Zealand Bloodstock Ready to Run Sale.
Ceolwulf, Pride says, was probably worth at least double what he paid for the Cambridge Stud-bred and Riversley Park-consigned son of Tavistock but he was overlooked by some members of the buying bench because of his x-ray issues.
Vets identified a subchondral lucency in his right stifle, deemed to be moderate risk, and a small fragment in Ceolwulf’s left front fetlock adjacent to his sesamoid bone that could not be surgically removed.
“He had an x-ray issue which allowed us to buy him because he was a pretty stylish colt. He breezed up well and without his x-rays he might have been a $400,000 horse and I wouldn’t have bought him at that price,” Pride told The Straight.
“I asked my vet and he said the way I train he’d take a punt on him. I have always got to compromise a little bit because I’m not buying for above $200,000 to $250,000 and I’d rather go with the style of horse that I like with a decent pedigree and be confident that I can manage the horse from a soundness perspective.
“It was a punt on those x-rays but, touchwood, he’s been a very sound horse.”
Interestingly, Hong Kong buyers are generally most put off by apparent x-ray faults, but Magus Equine’s Willie Leung - a regular at the three Australasian two-year-old sales each October and November - saw past those veterinary issues, underbidding the colt who breezed up in 10.77 seconds.
With a brief of finding a Guineas and Derby horse, Pride identified Ceolwulf at the Karaka sale with the help of New Zealander Leighton Howl. Howl bought 10 per cent in the horse and Pride’s stable clients took the rest.
“I have been going to the sales for 20 years and I’ve been going to the Ready to Runs for a long time and I’ve looked at a lot of Tavistocks like a lot of us have,” Howl said.
“He is probably the only Tavistock that looked like the sire when he was a racehorse and (New Zealand racing journalist) Dennis Ryan would probably confirm that as well.
“He had a lot of quality about him and, to be honest, I thought he was probably the best Tavistock I’d looked at.”
Twice Group 1-placed at three in the Rosehill Guineas and Australian Derby, Ceolwulf’s Epsom victory capped off a good year for Howl who also bought Satono Aladdin gelding Lupo Solitario, last December’s Group 3 Bonecrusher winner for trainer Danica Guy, who was on-sold to Hong Kong trainer Frankie Lor.
Howl paid $82,500 for Lupo Solitario of the Book 2 draft of Rich Hill at the 2022 NZB National Yearling Sale. He is being targeted at the Hong Kong Derby.
Pride and Howl will be back at Karaka in November hoping to find another Guineas or Derby diamond at the two-year-old sale.
