Supreme Thoroughbreds celebrates twelve years of operation this year and they have previously been crowned as leading vendors at the Premier Inglis Sale.

The Impact chats with the co-owner Brent Grayling about his 2019 draft and his farm,

Q: Supreme Thoroughbreds is considered the home of fast horses. How did your journey begin down this road of excelling in the breeding industry?

A: My wife Adrienne and myself, together with Neil and Sue Shaw, formed Supreme Thoroughbreds out of a desire to have a farm for our own broodmares.  When we started all we had was one horse, one bucket and one lead but our ultimate goal was to be top of the Melbourne Premier sale. This life-long dream came true in 2017 when Supreme Thoroughbreds was leading vendor by aggregate selling 28 yearlings in P1 for $3,572,500; Supreme sold two of the 6 horses that sold for $500,000 or more, and Supreme sold the filly with the highest price tag of $500,000.

It was a rewarding result for the huge effort put in by everyone on the team - and it’s the team that I credit with our past and continued success.  We have built a loyal, hard-working team and we’ve grown together over the journey.

Q: The Supreme draft is the biggest, what can buyers expect from your 2019 draft, in terms of quality?

A: Yes, our draft is the biggest and that’s because we made a strategic business decision some years ago to focus on the Melbourne Premier Sale.  So all the buyers know we bring our best to Melbourne. This year our draft has something for every buyer and every market and every wallet.

Q: If I’m looking for something special in your draft where should I start?

A: This may sound disingenuous but all the yearlings in our draft are very nice for one reason or another.  But if I was pushed to choose, the best all-round colt, in my opinion, is Lot 150 Dora’s Ready x Zoustar. He is a big, strong, scopey colt – he is well-balanced and very imposing.  This colt has a laid-back attitude and nothing is a problem.  He will be very popular out at Oaklands.  The best all-around filly is the very next lot, Lot 151, Dowager Princess x Vancouver.  She is a high-class, running filly that everyone will love.  She is very sleek and is a filly I would love to own myself.

Q: Which particular yearling in recent years gave you the most pleasant surprise with the sale price?

A: One of the most personally satisfying sales was from the 2017 Melbourne Premier Yearling Sale when we sold rectangle x Written Tycoon colt for A$500,000. Part owner, Brooke Douglas, was a hard-working fruit picker and part-time breeder from Tasmania.  She just liked the mare and she’d bought her very cheaply - for something like AUD$3,000.  Brooke was not expecting such a high price and she was blown away when the hammer came down.  I thought she was going to faint.  

The colt was a brother to Bendigo Guineas winner, Written Up.  The Octangle x Written Tycoon colt was purchased by the Hong Kong Jockey Club and Mark Richards commented  "There were a few by Written Tycoon on our list - he's got a great strike rate in Hong Kong - and I thought he was the best of them. We probably went a little bit further than I thought but at the end of the day the breed seems to be working extremely well in Hong Kong and we haven't been able to get hold of one previously.”

The money made a big difference in Brooke’slife and she became somewhat of a local legend in Tasmania.

Q: As a breeder, what would you say makes the most commercial horse?

A: The sire – it’s all about the stallion and how they performed on the track and then how their progeny performs on the track.

Q: Who would you say was your most special horse and why?

A: Our most special horse was Hassan.  He was a Fastnet Rock colt out of our mare Snow Hero.  We bred and sold him at the 2011 Melbourne Premier Yearling Sale for AUD$260,000 to Manny and Peter Gelagotis. This was the most the Gelagotis boys had paid for a yearling up until then and Hvasstan went on to be a Group 2 and Group 3 winner.  When he finished his racing career he went to stud and his career at stud got off to a flying start last month when Jelviss

(Big Jet Plane x Hvasstan 16) who was only his 2nd starter, won on debut in grand style in Beaudesert as a 2-year-old.

Q: Please tell us a bit more about your family and how you got involved in racing?

A: I was born in New Zealand and grew up around harness racing.  I’ve always had a love of horses and I moved my young family to Australia because there were more opportunities here.  My wife, Adrienne, who is a very skilled and experienced broodmare manager, and I worked on various horse farms and we eventually found ourselves in Victoria setting up Eliza Park for the Fleming family.  We planned and supervised it being built from the ground up and then ran it until we left to join with Sue and Neil to start Supreme Thoroughbreds.

The foreman on our main farm in Romsey, Ben Tyrrell, and his wife Bec both left Eliza Park to join Supreme some 9 years ago.  And a few years ago my youngest son Chris and his partner Amy left their positions at Yarraman Park, a leading stud in the Hunter Valley, to join Supreme.

Q: And finally, if you could spend a day in someone else’s shoes, whose would be they are and why?

A: I would love to be champion jockey Hugh Bowman on a Saturday and get the pleasure of riding Winx to victory!

Brent Image credit: Supreme Thoroughbreds

Written Tycoon Image credit: dynamic syndications