Award-winning broadcaster Nick Luck was among the first-time visitors to this year's Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale. A fresh stamp in his passport was not the only thing he collected while in Australia.
He had been busy hosting his Nick Luck Daily Podcast from the complex, but went from commentator to active participant Jan. 16 when teaming up with the leading training partnership of Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott to secure not one but two fillies.
First, a daughter of Russian Revolution and the group 2-winning Lope de Vega mare Spanish Reef were snared for AU$240,000 before a Toronado filly was added to the string at AU$230,000. The brace were signed for by Lucky Down Under, Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott, and Kestrel Thoroughbreds.
Asked if buying had been part of his original plan, Luck said: "Not quite! I was told that nothing good ever happens after midnight, but I would dispute that. Last night I said to Emma Coleman, who works with Gai and Adrian, that I'd be quite interested in taking a tiny share of something down here. I've always thought that would be good fun.
"Emma, as quick as you like and being the brilliant saleswoman that she is, turned around and said, 'I have a much better idea, why don't we set up your syndicate down here?' When you put it like that, it suddenly sounded like a good idea, in my slightly hazy state. Everybody said you won't leave the sale without buying a horse."
The event is not merely a yearling sale, with Magic Millions taking over the Gold Coast with its associated and highly lucrative race meeting, polo, show jumping, and an exhibition gallop on the beach also among the festivities.
Having attended the four-day Book 1, conducting interviews with the likes of the sale's co-owners Katie Page-Harvey and husband Gerry Harvey, John Warren, Mike Tindall, and actor Daniel MacPherson, best known for playing Joel Samuels in "Neighbours," Luck said he had been well and truly won over by the Magic Millions concept.
"It's social in the very best sense of the word," he said. "And I don't just mean people partying, although that side of it is done extremely well, but there's a real sense of community about it. I was just on the phone to my brother, who's taking a share, so is watching online, and he said 'I can't get over how many families and kids are there.' There's a really strong sense of people enjoying each other's company.
"I'm not exactly sure how that vibe has been created, and I realize it's the beginning of the sales season, it's sunny, we're by the beach, that all helps. But there's something very authentic about it. I think Katie understands that the horse is the center of the entertainment. I think that's why it appears to be so successful."
Luck compared the atmosphere to Fasig-Tipton's The Saratoga Sale and, like so many visiting Europeans, welcomed the shorter days of selling, which tended to finish not long after 5 p.m.
"It's a bit like Saratoga," he said. "And the two places are not similar, but everyone has been raving about it and you get here and think 'yes?' But, two or three days later, it's sucked you in completely and you don't want to leave. I'd say it's a bit like that here.
"There's a great theater about the auctioneering. They're intelligible but they're quick. You get what's going but it's not laborious like some of the auctions can be elsewhere in the world. That then takes the pressure off the staff, who've been working since 4 in the morning. That's got to be a good thing."
On plans for the daughter of Russian Revolution, he said: "Gai has already suggested that the Gimcrack should be our big target at the beginning of October. Given how many group 1 winners she's taken home out of this sales ring, I'm not going to start arguing with her."
Luck added he was still working on a name for the filly out of Spanish Reef, but suggested her pedigree should provide ample possibilities.
"Emma wants to call the syndicate the Lucky Down Under Syndicate," he said. "That's fine but I'm not sure we'd want to call the filly that. It might raise a few eyebrows!"
