LAST Friday’s Tattersalls Cheltenham Sale produced some outstanding prices, headed by three horses who had finished first, second and third in a Tattersalls Farm point-to-point the previous Sunday selling for a total of £905,000 (€1.06 million). A total of 54 horses were offered for sale after racing and all bar four of them were sold, the average price coming in at £85,770.

This was the first sale staged on-site at Cheltenham since the 2020 Festival and a packed sales ring saw a total of £4.3 million spent at what is believed to have been a record turnover for any select point-to-point sale. Some 14 lots made six figures and were snapped up by 12 individual buyers.

All but one of the 14 top lots came from Irish point-to-point yards. However, just three of them look guaranteed to come back into training in Ireland.

Two of the three top-priced lots – all of whom ran in the same maiden the previous weekend – are heading back to Ireland. The winner, Present Soldier, sold for £300,000 and will join Gordon Elliott, while runner-up Arctic Bresil, who topped the sale at £305,000, will go to an as-yet-unnamed Irish trainer.

Trained by Sean ‘Farmer’ Doyle, Arctic Bresil made his debut a month earlier at Curraghmore and looked likely to win when unseating his rider. The four-year-old gelding is by Blue Bresil and, bred by Goldford Stud, was a €62,000 purchase at the 2020 Derby Sale. He is a half-brother to two minor British winners, Parody and Arctic Road.

Bloodstock agent Gerry Hogan bought him for £305,000 and revealed the horse was likely to be trained in Ireland.

Present Soldier was trained by Denis Murphy when second in the now legendary Tattersalls Farm maiden. Related to The Bosses Oscar, he was sold by his breeder Michael Dixon for €33,000 as foal at Goffs to Richard Frisby and unsold at the 2020 Derby Sale, later bought privately by Murphy and Joey Logan.

David Minton of Highflyer made a play for the horse last Friday but lost out at £300,000 to Mouse O’Ryan and Gordon Elliott for owners Dave Page and Dave Rabson of KTDA Racing.

Incredibly, the third-placed horse in that same race just six days ago, Master Chewy, also realised £300,000 when selling to William Twiston-Davies. The succesful purchaser, who missed out on the top two lots, secured this one after a protracted bidding duel with underbidder Harold Kirk. Consigned by Pat Doyle’s Suirview Stables, Master Chewy is by Walk In The Park and will now go into training with Cheltenham Gold Cup-winning trainer Nigel Twiston-Davies for owners Anne-Marie and Jamie Shepperd, who had success at Cheltenham on Sunday with I Like To Move It.

Master Chewy was bred by James Hoare and was sold for €28,000 as a foal at Tattersalls Ireland. As a three-year-old he was unsold at the Goffs UK Summer Sale, and he was trained for his point-to-point by Pat Doyle for owner Paul Hennessy.

The distances in that Tattersalls Farm maiden were three-parts of a length and the same. Incidentally, the fourth horse home was the Gordon Elliott-trained An Mhi, who actually started favourite and was only beaten another three lengths.

Donnchadh’s double

Donnchadh Doyle sold the fourth- and fifth-highest priced horses at last weekend’s sale. Fetching £235,000 was the filly Smiling Getaway, who was the impressive debut winner of her maiden at Loughanmore last month. She was purchased by James and Jean Potter, owners of good chaser Mister Fisher and Yorton Farm. Dan Skelton will train her.

Christian Williams will train Not Long Left, a four-year-old gelding by Presenting who finished second on his debut for Donnchadh Doyle at Dromahane earlier this month. This one cost £200,000 and the Welsh trainer also signed for Curraghmore runner-up Camulus (£105,00) from Denis Hogan’s yard and Montgomery (£100,000), trained by Tom Lacey to finish second in a Worcester bumper.

Of the other £100,000-plus transactions, it was good to see Tom Gibney get Hartur D’Arc, a Loughanmore winner for Pat Turley, while Denis Murphy also sold Tattersalls Farm winner Chasing Fire (by Maxios) to Aiden and Olly Murphy for £170,000.