Racing: Butt goes all the way with sales topper

Tim Butt is on a hiding to nothing when he buys yearlings.

And that hiding could be bigger than ever after he outlaid a sales-topping $210,000 for a standardbred filly in Christchurch yesterday.

In the last five years Butt has, somewhat unfairly, gained a reputation as lacking the golden touch he brings to training when it comes to the sales ring.

While Butt has trained champion trotters Lyell Creek and Take A Moment as well as open class pacers Happy Asset, Pocket Me, Foreal and Mister D G, he has little group one success with his sales day purchases.

The pressure will be on to change that after Butt paid the top price of yearling sales week so far in purchasing a Christian Cullen filly from Spirit Of Beth.

The slinky filly is a member of one of New Zealand's hottest families, with Stars And Stripes and Light And Sound close up in her pedigree.

She was bought for Butt's biggest owner, Perth-based businessman Neven Botica, who also outlaid $100,000 for another Christian Cullen filly from the Elsu family.

Botica also paid $100,000 for a Christian Cullen colt at Karaka on Monday.

"Neven hasn't bought at the yearling sales here in the last two years but he was very keen to get involved this year," said Butt.

"He wants to start his own broodmare band and eventually these fillies will end up in Perth where the breeding isn't as strong as here. He is hoping he can raise the bar over there."

Butt says while he is not known for his yearling sales success he feels those statistics are often unfairly compared.

"The last two years I have had youngsters good enough to place in the big 2-year-olds races but they get forgotten because everybody knows us for what the trotters and our open class pacers do.

"But we have the horsepower now to change that and with us not having the same strength in the open class ranks as we did a couple of years ago maybe we can start a new reputation as juvenile trainers instead," he only half joked.

The $210,000 filly is the fourth most expensive standardbred yearling sold in New Zealand, with the record price of $365,000 for Roydon Reign paid back in the crazy days before the sharemarket crash in the late 1980s. At the same time another filly fetched $340,000.

Since then only one other horse has broken $200,000 as a genuine sale, although Christian Cullen's half brother Oscar Dela Hoya was a buyback over that level.

Butt says the purchase comes with no pressure. "Neven is a great owner and knows things can go wrong with horses. And regardless of what she does on the racetrack she is worth that much as a broodmare. If she can run even a little bit every one of her foals could be worth more than $100,000."

Yesterday's sale was typical of Christchurch auctions, with the day slow to start and vendors dropping their heads halfway through the day.

But the big money soon started to come, predictably for the stock of Christian Cullen, and most of it was from outside the home province.

South Auckland trainer Geoff Small paid $110,000 for a Christian Cullen brother to New Zealand Derby winner Likmesiah and Mighty Cullen.

"I liked him a lot. He is racy and you can't really beat his breeding," said Small.

"The way the good colts are selling he could end up being a cheap horse."

Most other northern trainers were busy, with Barry Purdon and Tony Herlihy also involved at the top end of the market.

There was also good interest from Australia, although many of the transtasman visitors were blown away by the strength of the local money.

The huge buys in the second half saw the average for the first day of the two-day sale hovering just under $25,000, an over 20 per cent increase on last year's quiet sale.