Golden thread runs through battle for freshman sire honours
The Golden Rose’s influence runs deep through this season’s freshman sire ranks, with winners In The Congo and Jacquinot represented by their first two-year-olds, while 2021 runner-up Anamoe enters as the early benchmark for first-season sire honours.
Almost five years after the 2021 Golden Rose, the first three colts across the line – In The Congo (first), Anamoe (second) and Artorius (fourth overall) – are competing against each other again, with the trio among 19 stallions with commercial first crops of two-year-olds at the races this season.
Their paths have diverged markedly since Rosehill. Darley’s Anamoe developed into a nine-time Group 1 winner and now leads the intake commercially, with 50 named two-year-olds from 109 foals and the cohort’s only seven-figure yearling. Newgate’s Golden Rose winner In The Congo has 21 named progeny from 93 foals, while studmate and Blue Diamond winner Artorius has 16 from a crop of 109.
The Golden Rose thread extends into the following year’s edition. Widden’s Jacquinot won the 2022 race, in which fellow freshmen Sejardan and Twin Hills’ Daumier finished seventh and ninth respectively.
A wider group also includes Arrowfield’s Hitotsu, Newgate’s Cox Plate winner State Of Rest and Windsor Park’s Profondo, whose 117 foals make his the largest first crop in the intake.
Another dozen stallions stood at fees of $27,500 or less and enter the season with smaller books and thinner sales evidence.
Six stallions in the intake have first crops of 100 or more foals. Profondo leads with 117, followed by Hitotsu on 112, Anamoe and Artorius on 109 each, and Jacquinot on 108. In The Congo (93), Stronger (90), State Of Rest (81) and Top Ranked (80) complete the group with 80 or more.
The smaller crops belong to Ellsberg (28 foals), Marine One (38), Paulele (55), Aysar and Dalasan (57 each) and Daumier (58).
Naming rates before the season tell a different story from raw foal numbers.
Anamoe’s 50 named progeny represent 46 per cent of his crop. In The Congo has 21 named from 93 foals and Jacquinot 23 from 108.
Top Ranked, who stood for $7700, has 18 named from 80, a higher proportion than Hitotsu (15 from 112) or Artorius (16 from 109). Profondo, with the biggest crop, has eight named.
The 2026 yearling sale results reinforced Anamoe’s position at the head of the intake. His 65 yearlings sold for a gross of $25.595 million at an average of $393,769 and a median of $350,000. He cleared 85.5 per cent of the 76 yearlings offered.
In The Congo and Jacquinot were the only other stallions in the group to average more than $100,000.
From 52 yearlings, In The Congo’s progeny sold at an average of $111,961 and a median of $71,250, while Jacquinot sold 60 at an average of $109,228 and a median of $87,500. Their respective gross returns were $5.822 million and $6.554 million.
Hitotsu led the next group, selling 53 yearlings at an average of $81,503 and clearing 89.8 per cent of those offered.
State Of Rest averaged $79,171 from 42 sold, Artorius $68,138 from 53 and Profondo $89,051 from 55. Profondo’s $4.898 million gross was the fourth-highest in the intake, behind Anamoe, Jacquinot and In The Congo.
Clearance provided a different ranking. Marine One sold 17 of 18 offered for 94.4 per cent, ahead of Lightsaber at 92.6 per cent, Sejardan at 92 per cent and State Of Rest at 91.3 per cent. Those rates came from smaller offerings than the leading sires, but showed demand extending beyond the highest-priced stallions.
Comparing average price with the fee paid when the mating was made also favoured several lower-fee stallions.
Dalasan’s $54,333 average was 9.9 times his $5,500 fee, although only three yearlings sold. Lightsaber averaged 7.4 times his fee from 25 sold, Marine One 6.1 times from 17, Top Ranked 5.6 times from 23 and Profondo 5.1 times from 55.
These are sale-price-to-fee multiples, not measures of vendor profit, because they do not account for production, preparation or other costs.
Anamoe stood for $121,000 in his first season at Darley, the most expensive introductory fee in the group by a wide margin. He was the only freshman sire represented by a seven-figure yearling in 2026, and his 65 yearlings sold averaged $393,769 with a median of $350,000.
His top lot, a colt from Listed winner Secret Trail (purchased and syndicated as a yearling by Straight Six Racing’s Michael Ward with his brother while previously an owner of Triple Crown Syndications) sold by Widden Stud at the Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale, made $1.1 million to Ciaron Maher Bloodstock and David Redvers Bloodstock. No other first-season sire produced a yearling worth seven figures in 2026.
The demand rests on a racing record of 14 wins from 25 starts, nine Group 1 wins and A$11,127,025 in prize money. Anamoe won the Sires’ Produce Stakes at two and improved through his three-year-old and four-year-old seasons, when his Group 1 wins included the Cox Plate. He is by Street Boss out of Group 1 winner Anamato.
Source: The Straight
