THE 2021 JRHA Select Sale this year marked the final opportunity for buyers to purchase a yearling by Deep Impact, with four catalogued, and it was the first time in many years that there were no yearlings by the leading sire King Kamehameha.

With such a watershed moment, it might have seemed probable that the results, especially in a period of great uncertainty in Japan around Covid, would be likely to remain flat, or even see a fall. The polar opposite was the outcome.