Not too late to find a pinhook
It doesn’t seem long since we were in Deauville for the Arqana December Sale and we’ll soon be back on the sales beat.
I’ll be off to Newmarket next week to see the stallion parade and attend the Tattersalls February Sale before William and I both head back to France for Arqana’s February Sale. Both catalogues contain a number of weanlings or ‘short’ yearlings, so anyone who is still interested in pinhooking for the autumn yearling sales – or indeed looking to find a filly out of training to cover this year – please get in touch and we’d be happy to help.
I’ve said before how much I love buying foals and we’ve had some great success with our pinhooks over the last few years. I’m very fussy when it comes to selecting foals – probably from the many years watching my dad at work at the Queen’s Polhampton Stud then working with the mares and foals myself at Highclere. There are a number of conformation faults I can't forgive but I love trying to see the athlete in these youngsters.
For the last two years, we’ve recorded decent profits from the Norris/Huntingdon pinhooking ventures: in 2012, we bought five foals for a total of £319,000 and sold them as yearlings for £840,000. The 2013 foals bought for £683,000 were sold for a total of £1,152,750.
We’re proud of this achievement we're happy to help any new clients in this regard so please give me a call if you’re interested in getting involved this year.
We’re expecting seven foals at the farm this spring and one of them has already arrived – a gorgeous colt (above) by Invincible Spirit out of the Sinndar mare Alaia, who was born on 28 January. On the personal front, I’m particularly looking forward to my mare Villabella foaling a bit later this spring as she is carrying a first-crop foal by Dabirsim, who was an excellent two-year-old and is now standing at stud in Germany. He’s a stallion I really believe in and I’ve just sent my maiden mare Clutter, whom I bought from Juddmonte last July, to visit him this year. Exciting times ahead, I hope.
