Roderic Kavanagh

DEAUVILLE, FRANCE -- On the eve of Zanthos's eagerly-anticipated return in the French 1,000 Guineas, the Rockfel Stakes winner's consignor Roderic Kavanagh unleashed another show-stopping Sioux Nation filly at €1.1million to Anthony Stroud at the Arqana Breeze-Up Sale. Kavanagh turned Zanthos from a €48,000 yearling into a €1 million sensation at this sale 12 months ago and now the Simon and Ed Crisford-trained filly is as short as 7-1 to taste Classic glory for Victorious Forever at ParisLongchamp on Sunday.  Stroud revealed that the Sioux Nation filly, bred on the...

For the second consecutive year, a daughter of Sioux Nation had Roderic Kavanagh and Cormac O'Flynn of Glending Stables celebrating a seven-figure windfall at the Arqana Breeze-up Sale when lot 82 was knocked down to Anthony Stroud for €1,100,000. Twelve months ago, it was a similar story when Stroud struck the winning bid of €1,000,000 for a Sioux Nation filly from the Kildaragh Stud draft. Later named Zanthos, she returns to France this weekend as a leading contender for Sunday's Poule d'Essai des Pouliches in the Victorious Forever silks, having...

More questions than answers have been generated from a shaky start to the breeze-up season and now the focus turns to Deauville, where the Arqana Breeze-Up Sale will provide the clearest barometer yet about the overall health within that sector.  Boutique by design, Arqana boasts a broad international reach underpinned by a stellar roll of honour - last year's 2,000 Guineas winner Ruling Court, the ill-fated champion two-year-old Gewan and even this year's 2,000 Guineas third Distant Storm were all sourced here within the past couple of years.  This is...

Nobody wants to be late to the party. That statement applies to just about every aspect in business and is especially pertinent with a view towards breeding.  Everyone would love to send mares to Mehmas and Starman but, the reality of the situation is that many breeders' mating plans are dictated just as much by their pockets as it is by their head. The trick is cottoning on to the next Mehmas and the next Starman before they go north - and that can be easier said than done.  Luckily...

DEAUVILLE, France--The temperature is rising at Arqana and so, too, are the stakes. Breeze-up consignors young and old have made no secret about the fact that trade this year has been tricky, particularly at the middle to lower tiers.  All duck or no dinner, feast or famine--whatever way you want to describe it, vendors have had to negotiate some choppy waters, meaning a lot is still on the line at Arqana when the sale gets underway at 11am on Saturday. But, weirdly, the optimism is palpable. Maybe it's the baking...

The cliche of the difficult second album is very real. You have just recorded your greatest hit so, in many ways, you could feel destined to fail in attempting to follow up on something so special. Roderic Kavanagh set the bar pretty high in consigning Vandeek (GB) (Havana Grey {GB}) at the Tattersalls Craven Breeze-Up Sale last year. The colt, bought by Anthony Stroud on behalf of KHK Racing, has turned out to be a dual Group 1-winning superstar who has yet to taste defeat. That's what you call a...

"Their welfare was our livelihood." Peter Kavanagh could easily be talking about the mares and foals out in the paddocks at Kildaragh Stud. In fact he is casting his mind back to childhood days on his family's cattle farm.  Though racing and breeding are increasingly observed through the prism of the data supplied by technology, a back-to-basics approach would stand any aspiring breeder in good stead, as would an hour spent listening to Kavanagh. There's a touch of the John Cleese about him: long legs which could easily propel him...

It's that time of year again, the Tattersalls Craven Breeze Up Sale--where whispers of Royal Ascot horses and potential breeze-up sensations fills the air.  There's scarcely anything more exciting than the eve of a major sale and they don't come much bigger than the Craven.  This is where Classic winners Native Trail (GB) (Oasis Dream {GB}) and Cachet (Ire) (Aclaim {Ire}) were found and the roll of honour does not stop there. Everything is up for grabs at Tattersalls over the next two days and few people know this better...