Goffs London Starts Royal Procession

Goffs stages its second London Sale Monday, and the boutique event, coined by Goffs Chief Executive Henry Beeby as the “unofficial curtain-raiser to Royal Ascot,” will offer 43 lots at The Orangery at Kensington Palace, with 13 scratches from the catalogue. The offerings are comprised of a select breeze-up bunch followed by horses in training, of which 22 hold entries at Royal Ascot throughout the week (click here for the TDN’s Goffs London preview). 

The 18 breeze-up lots were on display at Kempton Park yesterday, and their breeze videos are now online. Among the juveniles are youngsters by exciting young sires like Poet’s Voice (GB), Lope De Vega (Ire) and Zoffany (Ire), as well as the progeny of accomplished stallions such as Dark Angel (Ire), Candy Ride (Arg) and Giant’s Causeway. 

Last year’s inaugural Goffs London Sale was a pioneering event, and thus some logistical strings had to be pulled to ensure buyers of horses with Ascot entries could run their purchases in their colors that week, some as soon as the following day. Goffs put in place an agreement with the British Horseracing Authority and Weatherbys to ensure this could happen, as long as the buyer and trainer are registered with the BHA or in another recognized racing jurisdiction, and that same agreement is in place this year. The experiment was a success last year, with the £1.3 sale-topping 2-year-old Cappella Sansevero (GB) (Showcasing {GB}) finishing second for his new owner, Qatar Racing, in the following day’s G2 Coventry S., and the Goffs London Sale was more recently represented by a new Group 1 winner from its inaugural class in the form of Pornichet (Fr) (Vespone {Ire}), who was bought privately by Gai Waterhouse and won the G1 Doomben Cup Down Under May 9. 

“Our second Goffs London Sale, in association with QIPCO, takes up where we left off last year with a quality catalogue full of Royal Ascot potential,” said Beeby. “This is a sale that offers buyers something quite unique, as they can literally go from sales ring to Royal Ascot within 24 hours.”