Dr Rascal is not for selling. Not yet anyway, maybe not ever. The unbeaten G2 Vintage Stakes winner is one of the most exciting juveniles in Britain, a colt with precocity, speed, size and strength, and a pedigree that suggests he’ll stay farther and improve further.
That’s the kind of horse that sets the bells ringing in Hong Kong. The type of horse the astute retired trainer John Moore would have been hopping on a plane then driving in a car down to Whatcombe, Berkshire to see for himself back in the days when a good slice of his summer break was spent sourcing the next PP (Private Purchase) with Hong Kong Derby potential for his Sha Tin stable.
No one did it better than Moore, nor has done since. But while the trainer pecking order in Hong Kong is different nowadays, there is still a thirst for finding a top class European import with Hong Kong’s three-race classic series in mind.
But if a Hong Kong owner wants to buy a proven stakes horse out of Europe, they’d better be prepared to offload a hefty wedge of cash. They usually are, mind you. Seven figures sterling will do it, no less, for a Group race-winning two or three-year-old with apparent Hong Kong Derby potential.
How far into seven figures? Well, that all depends on just how classy, how proven, how many agents are on their phones in private negotiations, and how willing or reluctant to sell the horse’s existing owner is.
When Dr Rascal won his first two races, agents working for Hong Kong connections would have noted immediately that the colt’s owners were not the big battalions like Godolphin or Wathnan. Being relatively small-scale ‘boutique’ owner-breeders, with five mares boarding at Trinity Park Stud and less than 10 horses in training, they would have been pegged as likely sellers.
The colt was the subject of a number of big bids before and since his Goodwood win. So far his owner-breeders, Julia Rosier and her son Charlie Rosier, have not been tempted to sell.
“We were dealing with agents before he ran at Goodwood, and we were offered good money from Hong Kong, then those offers obviously got bigger,” Charlie Rosier told Idol Horse.
The colt skipped Royal Ascot in favour of the Vintage Stakes at Goodwood, the racecourse where Julia Rosier has long been a member and where she had her first winner, Piccolo Player, as a small part of a syndicate 26 years ago. Charlie had his first winner, Smoothtalkinrascal, in 2012, they had shares in Middleham Park Racing’s G1 St Leger second Ventura Storm, and since then they have invested significantly, breeding and owning ‘Rascal’ horses together.
“For us, it’s an amazing journey to be on and if we can keep a horse like him, it puts us at the top table,” Rosier continued. “These offers are amazing from all around the world, but the reality is, when you go to the sales, you go to Book One at Tattersalls, you go to Book Two, you go to Arqana, you’re still up against all of the big players who’ve still got way deeper pockets, even if you were armed with a bigger pot.
“And so, for me and for my mum, the journey that this horse can take us on is the most special thing and it’s obviously super important and lovely for us to be able to do it together.”
One factor in not selling is that the Rosiers have Dr Rascal’s half-brother, by Vandeek, who is heading to Tattersalls to be sold, and likely for serious money. The dam, Litte Miss Rascal, has also produced the talented but ill-fated G2 Queen Mary Stakes fifth Miss Rascal. So far, Litte Miss Rascal has the quirk of only getting in foal every other year and her covering to Sottsass, which produced Dr Rascal, only happened because she failed to get in foal from three visits to Gleneagles that spring.
“It’s going to be Vandeek’s first crop going to the sales,” Rosier continued. “The yearling will be in Book One, he could be worth an absolute fortune. So one of our sort of other thoughts is if we could just try and build a bit more black type over here with Dr Rascal.”
The dream is real for the Rosiers. The G1 National Stakes could be next for their Oliver Cole-trained juvenile; he could then go to the G1 Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere; being by Sottsass, next year’s G1 Prix du Jockey Club, the French Derby, is also being whispered.
“But look,” Rosier added, “we’re loving the journey and we really want to be involved with this horse, we love him so much and we own a hundred per cent of him, which is very special. But the reality is, if something big, really big, does come round the corner, then we might struggle not to sell.”
Will Douglass knows this. The Marlborough-based agent is one of those who put in a bid for Dr Rascal on behalf of a Hong Kong client. He has been buying for Hong Kong for well over a decade: Peniaphobia, Rise High, Playa Del Puente, More Than This and Big Time Baby are among his higher profile purchases for export out of Europe.
But while Dr Rascal has eluded him, he has already secured an exciting prospect out of Royal Ascot, the G3 Hampton Court Stakes winner Generic, bought from Jeff Smith, an owner-breeder whose purple colours have been carried by top-class horses since the 1980s and include Chief Singer, Dashing Blade, Lochsong, Persian Punch, Arabian Queen and Alcohol Free.
Smith was up for selling when Douglass approached him for the three-year-old, who is now headed to James Cummings’s stable.
“Jeff Smith didn’t breed him and I think he’s more open to selling horses he’s bought as foals and Generic was already a gelding as well, so two boxes ticked,” Douglass told Idol Horse, adding that he felt the sire Kameko’s offspring would suit Hong Kong with its fast tracks.
“There were quite a lot (of agents) on Generic. We made what I felt was a really good offer and then there was a price put on the horse from Mr. Smith, who was very straightforward and he said, ‘That’s it, I’m not moving from that,’ and he’s a gentleman, an old-fashioned English owner. So, that was basically how it worked.”
Douglass also made an unsuccessful bid for the formerly Karl Burke-trained Alparslan, winner of the G3 Greenham Stakes in the spring, who was eventually purchased for Douglas Whyte’s stable via agent Mark McStay.
“I’ve had what I would call a really good run this year,” Douglass said. “For me, the demand seems up, the Hong Kong owners seem really interested and keen and the Hong Kong Jockey Club has been helpful on that front. I think Europe historically always has such few horses that it’s hard to compete. But I think what has been going there to Hong Kong for the last few years has been doing well.”
Hong Kong buyers’ propensity to follow trends of recent success has helped Europe’s cause, with the great Romantic Warrior still racing impeccably, and being European-bred and sourced, albeit an unraced ISG rather than a proven PP when he started out in Hong Kong. Two of the last five Hong Kong Derby winners came from Europe, and two of those five were PPs.
Eric Sze, a Hong Kong-based agent whose clients include Peter Lau, Romantic Warrior’s owner, was also around the Dr Rascal bids.
“The trickiest part is finding a ready-made Derby horse for Hong Kong because not every year do you have a horse with the right profile, owned by the right owners, who would sell,” Sze said. “So that is the tricky part that stops buyers from finding a good-quality batch year in, year out.
“And people tend to overweigh the recent information they have, so you can almost always predict what people are buying based on last year’s Derby or Classic Series. Last year, the horse that performed the best in the Derby as a PP was Numbers, who came out of the Queensland Derby, and then this year you can see quite a number of horses have been purchased out of that race again.”
Australia’s G1 Queensland Derby has been targeted heavily this time around with the first three home, Providence, Monopolistic and Inspired Legend all headed to Hong Kong – the first two sold – along with the already Hong Kong-owned Beauty Swift and the since-sold Kilman who finished down the field.
“And then, if you look back a little more,” Sze continued, “after Massive Sovereign won the Derby, I think that’s the year when Coolmore sold the most horses to Hong Kong over the summer. So you can always sort of predict, or see, which part of the world and what kind of races will be hotter for the upcoming year for the PPs.”
All of this, he says, is part of why he seeks out the year-younger juveniles such as Dr Rascal to purchase, like Moore did all those years ago with one of his six Derby winners, the Irish export Designs On Rome.
But chasing the right import can turn into a scramble of bids, and a protracted bidding process to nail that Hong Kong prospect is something Douglass is not keen to get too involved in.
“There can be lots of bids, left, right and centre,” Douglass said. “I advise the clients the best way to do it is to make your best bid. You know, this is where we value the horse at, you make your best bid and it stands for twenty four hours or one working day and after that we move on.
“I like to put a timer on it because bids do get drawn out, but I don’t think it’s good for anyone and I don’t think it does anyone a favour because just squeezing everyone for an extra bit doesn’t give you a great experience.”
As for Dr Rascal, if that mega bid does not arrive from somewhere, then the focus really could be the French Derby next year. That’s living the dream for any small owner. Firstly, though, the colt is likely to shoot for his first Group 1 at the Curragh in Ireland on September 13.
“We are leaning towards the National Stakes and then we’ve got other targets planned,” Rosier said. “We could go to the Jean-Luc Lagardere at Longchamp, as an example. But the reality is, he’s only going to get better as he steps up in trip.
“You look at what Coolmore have done recently and that French Derby has become absolutely massive, so that’s where we would love to try and go, really. But, yeah, it’s a strange position to be in. We’re still the little people in the game.”
But even with the intoxicating element of once-in-a-lifetime magic, Rosier too won’t rule out altogether a sale of some sort.
“Everyone knows in racing that there’s almost always a price for something,” he added. ∎
