David Ellis Purchases $1.1million Zoustar Colt

All the good judges were on Segenhoe Stud’s Zoustar colt from Ready to Soar at the Magic Millions on Tuesday with keen competition pushing the handsome chestnut colt past the $800,000 mark until David Ellis finally prevailed with a winning bid of $1.1million.

The colt is the first million dollar yearling of the sale for Widden Stud’s champion sire Zoustar and is the first foal of his dam, who is a three time winning sister to Group I Queensland Derby winner Eagle Way and a half-sister by More Than Ready (USA) to stakes-winners Impressive Eagle, Assertive Eagle and Soaressa.

“He is a sharp precocious type and I saw Henry Field, James Harron, George Moore, they were all bidding strongly on him. They’re all terrific judges,” said Peter O’Brien of Segenhoe.

Te Akau Racing’s David Ellis has hit the ground running at this year’s sale and not surprisingly given he purchased eight yearlings last year at the Gold Coast for $2.49million and to date five of them have raced and they are unbeaten Group II winner Captured by Love (f Written Tycoon), Group II placed winner Move to Strike (c Am Invincible), Group II placed winner Dream of the Moon (f All Too Hard), Unbridled Joy (c Snitzel), one start for a second and debut winner The Victress (Zousain).

“We’ve been very impressed with the quality that is here and we want to train these horses, so if we want to train them we’ve got to come here and buy them,” said Ellis.

“He has a great attitude, great pedigree and is a very, very athletic colt that I think can run, so we could be back here for the Magic Millions this time next year. That is what we are hoping.

“He’ll go into our stallion syndicate and we’ve got a lot of investors already but there are still a couple of shares left.”