In 2007 the newly rich Nathan Tinkler set sales rings alight, spending millions of dollars on yearlings to build a thoroughbred empire he hoped would rival that of Sheikh Mohammed.
Just six years later he is getting out of racing amid mounting debt and a fall in coal prices, the commodity which made him Australia’s youngest billionaire.
Tinkler, who now lives overseas, says he simply does not have the time to manage his racing business.
After a controversial year, his $300 million investment, Patinack Farm, is for sale.
But the trouble began early.
When he started buying thoroughbreds, Tinkler appointed trainer Anthony Cummings to help with the selection.
But after Cummings turned down the opportunity to be his exclusive trainer, things went sour between the pair and legal proceedings started.
That legal action was avoided when businessman Gerry Harvey stepped in to make the peace.
Harvey is the principal of the Magic Millions Sales company through which Tinkler’s racing investments, which includes properties at Sandy Hollow in the NSW Hunter Valley and at Canungra near Queensland’s Gold Coast, will be sold.
After Tinkler and Cummings parted ways, emerging trainer Jason Coyle took over, winning Group One races for the magnate until he was sacked along with other staff in September 2009.
It earned the organisation the nickname “Patinsack”.
Tinkler made John Thompson an offer he said he couldn’t refuse and Bart Cummings’s foreman stepped into the fold.
The two get on well but late last year, as rumours surfaced about unpaid bills including wages and race sponsorship, the trainer admitted in a radio interview that things were tough.
“I have gone weeks without farriers, bedding, run out of feed a number of times,” Thompson told Sky Sports Radio.
“But I think going forward he will come through the other end. I have good faith in him and he is very confident things are going to happen.”
Key racing staff left soon after and unfortunately good things have not happened.
The Australian Turf Club was forced to make an arrangement with Patinack to collect prize money won by the horses to pay for sponsorship and track fees.
The Melbourne Racing Club’s $1 million Blue Diamond Stakes in February was run under the Patinack banner but the Australian Oaks on April 27 ends the ATC’s sponsorship involvement with Tinkler.
William Inglis announced on Tuesday the Patinack draft had been withdrawn from the upcoming Easter yearling sale with Tinkler hoping to sell his operation as a complete package.
Just as Tinkler was getting started in 2007, Australia’s biggest owner Bob Ingham sold his Woodlands business to Sheikh Mohammed for $500 million in what was described as a once-in-a-lifetime deal.
It is believed Tinkler previously approached another Arab billionaire, Sheikh Fahad al Thani of Qatar, to buy his business but the owner of 2011 Melbourne Cup winner Dunaden knocked him back.
