LAST year’s record price for a beezer at Goffs UK was never threatened when the latest renewal of the Breeze Up Sale was held on Tuesday, and a much larger catalogue saw the clearance rate fall from a hugely impressive 90% a year ago to a more sobering 76% this time.

Demand for two-year-olds this week was selective and while the larger catalogue, up 36% in numbers, was instrumental is driving a modest 2% rise in aggregate, the key figures of average and median declined by 11% and 13% respectively.

With an increase in the number of lots realising £100,000 or more to 13, it was clear that demand for the better lots was good. However, the success in recent years of the breeze up sale has led to increased participation by vendors, leading to larger books on offer. Vendors at the lower end of the market found the going tougher.

Goffs UK Managing Director Tony Williams commented after the sale: “We marketed this sale extensively and travelled worldwide to attract an international buying bench, and we achieved that. It was wonderful to welcome a number of new faces to the Breeze Up Sale. Trade was strong throughout the day and the increase in this year’s number of six-figure lots demonstrates the strength at the top of the market. The old adage ‘breeze well - sell well’ was clearly evident.”

Three lots broke the £200,000 barrier and they were led by Bansha House Stud’s son of Kyllachy who sold to Curragh trainer Michael O’Callaghan for £220,000.

This half-brother to the Macau Derby-placed Weathervane was purchased by Con Marnane for €50,000 at the Goffs Orby Sale last year and is from the immediate family of the Group 1 winners Together, Jan Vermeer and Imperial Beauty. O’Callaghan is a huge fan of breeze up sales and his new acquisition was on behalf of his father.

O’Callaghan made a mark later in the day too when he paid £180,000 for Tally-Ho Stud’s home-bred Kodiac son of the winning Cape Cross mare Ermine Ruby.

The January-foaled colt is the first offspring of his dam and she is a half-sister to the Group 1 Prix de l’Abbaye de Longchamp winner Maarek. The colt’s grandam was a stakes-winning juvenile and so too were her siblings Inzar’s Best and Alexander Alliance. Another half-sister bred the Group 2 Flying Childers Stakes winner Ardad, now at stud.

A third six-figure lot to fall to O’Callaghan was Morna McDowell’s daughter of Showcasing and the two-year-old winner Solfilia. From the family of the Group 1 winning juvenile filly La Collina, this £55,000 purchase at Doncaster almost doubled in value, the Curragh handler securing her for £100,000.

The first lot to pass through the £200,000 barrier was the best-priced filly at the sale. Offered from Mark Dwyer’s Oaks Farm Stables, the daughter of Toronado is a half-sister to a two-year-old winner and out of a winning half-sister to the Aidan O’Brien-trained Great White Eagle, himself a 760,000gns breeze up graduate and later a Group 3 winning juvenile. Willie Browne paid £27,000 at Doncaster for the filly and Richard Brown of Blandford Bloodstock had to give £210,000 for her this time. She will be trained by William Haggas.

Scunthorpe United chairman Peter Swann has enjoyed plenty of success with his runners under the banner of the Cool Silk Partnership and the newest member of his team is a son of Showcasing, the first foal of a winning daughter of Shamardal. The colt’s third dam bred the Group 1 Lockinge Stakes winner Fly To The Stars and is grandam of the Group 1 Coronation Stakes winner Fallen For You.

Matt Coleman of Stroud Coleman signed the docket at £200,000 for the colt and this was a substantial profit for Johnny Collins’ Brown Island Stables who gave 38,000gns for him at Newmarket. The same purchasers went to £105,000 to acquire Lynn Lodge Stud’s Charm Spirit half-brother to the USA Grade 2 winner Juniper Pass. The colt was unsold as a yearling for €45,000.

Tally-Ho struck early in the sale when the fifth lot in the ring, a son of their resident sire Kodiac, sold to Peter Harper for £160,000. This half-brother to five winners was purchased at Tattersalls Ireland for €55,000 and his grandam won the Group 2 Cherry Hinton Stakes and was runner-up in both the Group 1 Cheveley Park Stakes and Moyglare Stud Stakes. Harper revealed that the colt was bought for Sheikh Sultan bin Ali Al Khalifa.

The Kodiac was not the first six-figure sale and two lots earlier The Bloodstock Connection’s Dark Angel full-brother to the Canadian Stakes winner Miss Katie Mae sold to David Redvers for £125,000, having been retained as a yearling for 50,000gns. The colt is also a half-brother too Group 3 winner Eastern Impact.

Hyde Park Stud paid just €22,000 for a son of Pivotal, the first foal of the stakes-placed Invincible Spirit mare Hoodna, at Tattersalls Ireland and saw the colt’s value soar to £140,000 when he was sold to Phoenix Thoroughbreds, with Ed Vaughan acting for them.

Longways Stables’ Kodiac colt out of the stakes-placed Dutch Rose was led out unsold at £90,000 but he was later sold for the much higher sum of £125,000 to Stephen Hillen and Richard Hughes. He was bought in the same ring for £40,000 last year.

Willie Browne’s Mocklershill sold a pair of six-figure lots. Hillen and Hughes combined again to give £110,000 for a son of Scat Daddy and The Irish Field Curragh Stakes winner Come To Heel, while Joe Murphy’s Crampscastle Bloodstock gave £100,000 for a Dark Angel filly, the first foal of the French stakes winner Riskit Fora Biskit, herself a daughter of Kodiac.

Jake Warren was attracted to Katie McGivern’s Derryconnor Stud’s Kodiac half-brother to Group 1 performer Hamza, and this grandson of Lady Alexander, the dam of Dandy Man, sold to the agent for £100,000 having been led out unsold as a yearling for €64,000 at the Tattersalls Ireland September Sale.