Zougotcha lived up to her billing as one of the banner lots of this year’s National Broodmare Sale on Tuesday, when she assumed a place among the most expensive mares ever sold in Australia.
The five-year-old daughter of Zoustar sold to Tom Magnier of Coolmore Stud for an eye-popping $5.25 million at the Magic Millions offering.
It makes the Chris Waller-trained miler the second most expensive mare ever sold in Australia, behind only I Am Invincible’s 10-time Group 1 winner Imperatriz, who smashed the previous record of $5m when sold for $6.6m at last year’s National Sale.
Magnier bought Zougotcha with the view to sending her to Coolmore’s superstar shuttle stallion Wootton Bassett, who will this year stand for an Australian record fee of $385,000, including GST.
“Having Wootton Bassett back this year, it gives us the confidence to find these mares and what he is doing both in Australia and Europe, we are very fortunate to be in this position and to get this mare,” Magnier said.
“We are very close to Sophie Baker and the Waller team and when you look at these top ones that they keep putting through the sale, they’re blue-chip mares for everyone.
“Hopefully they might be buying the offspring in years to come.”
Zougotcha was one of two Group 1-winning daughters of Zoustar that Magnier paid upwards of $2m for, also going to $2.1m for last year’s Sangster Stakes winner Climbing Star.
Zougotcha won eight of her 18 starts, with her Group 1 wins coming in the Flight Stakes (1600m) in the spring of her three-year-old season and last year’s Coolmore Classic (1500m) and Queen Of The Turf (1600m).
The first three bids on Tuesday were $1 million each before raises continued in $250,000 instalments until the hammer fell.
Zougotcha’s part-owner Christine Cook was at the Gold Coast complex to witness the sale and was emotional but proud of what the $2,685,000-earner achieved.
“It’s the end of one era and the start of another,” Cook said of the $500,000 yearling.
“It’s just unbelievable, genuinely unbelievable. I just hope she makes beautiful babies.”
Zougotcha was one of two Waller-trained three-time Group 1 winners offered for sale on Tuesday and the other, Atishu, also realized a big sale price.
The daughter of Savabeel was sold for $2.7m to Victorian farm Yulong, who will arrange a meeting with Alabama Express later in the year.
