Variety the spice of life for Brad

3 min read

Written by Paul Vettise

An "if you can’t beat them, join them" approach resulted in Victorian identity Brad Spicer among the buying action at the recent Tattersalls October Yearling Sale at Newmarket.

He signed for a colt by Sea The Stars (IRE), whose six successive Group 1 wins culminated in victory in the Prix l’Arc de Triomphe before retirement, for 125,000 guineas under his Spicer Thoroughbreds banner.

“It was a good week over there, the weather was fantastic and there were some nice staying pedigrees on show that we can’t access here,” he said.

“We’ve seen an influx of these European horses in Australia in the last 10 years or so and they’ve pretty much dominated so we thought we’d try to buy one.” – Brad Spicer.

“We’ve seen an influx of these European horses in Australia in the last 10 years or so and they’ve pretty much dominated so we thought we’d try to buy one.

“It’s the first time I’ve bought there and I had a couple of clients who wanted to get a staying horse. We’ll be bidding on a couple more in Book Two later this week.”

The Sea The Stars colt is out of Bright Halo (IRE) (Bigstone {IRE}), who has produced eight winners from 10 runners including the Group 2 performer Nantyglo (GB) (Mark Of Esteem {IRE}).

Group 1 family

It is the family of the Group 1 winners Moonstone (GB) (Dalakhani {IRE}) and Cerulean Sky (IRE) (Darshaan {GB}).

“The colt will be over there for the next four weeks and then he’ll fly to Australia and he’ll be treated like every other horse,” Spicer said.

“He’ll get broken in, but he won’t have too much pressure put on him and he’ll go to Darren Weir and probably end up at the beach at Warrnambool in Jarrod McLean’s care.

“Hopefully, we’ll get a nice Derby horse and head toward Queensland, that’s a way off obviously but that would the best case scenario.” – Brad Spicer.

“Hopefully, we’ll get a nice Derby horse and head toward Queensland, that’s a way off obviously but that would the best case scenario.”

Spicer returned from England late last Friday night and is preparing for an exciting week with Kings Will Dream (IRE) (Casamento {IRE}) in top shape for Saturday’s G1 Caulfield Cup.

“He’s really well and in terrific form in the weight-for-age races,” Spicer said. “He’ll drop down to 53kg and hopefully that makes the difference.”

King's Will Dream

In-form Cup contender

Trained by Weir, Kings Will Dream has placed in the G1 Memsie S., the G1 Makybe Diva S., and in the G1 Turnbull S., in his last three outings.

Another Spicer runner in top form for this weekend is the Weir-prepared Extra Brut (Domesday), who completed a hat-trick of victories when successful in the Listed UCI S., at Flemington.

“He’ll run in the Caulfield Classic and, all going well, on to the Derby,” Spicer said.