SON OF EMPIRE MAKER SELLS FOR $800,000

Article taken from the Thoroughhbred Times Today.

Reiley McDonald, representing Betty Moran's Brushwood Stable, fought off several other bidders at $800,000 to purchase a colt by EMPIRE MAKER about a half hour into the 2010 Fasig-Tipton Calder sale of selected two-year-olds in training on Tuesday.
The first foal produced by multiple Grade 2 winner Bank Audit, by Wild Rush, the colt worked one furlong in :10.6 at the presale breeze show and was consigned by Murray Smith, agent.

“We thought he was the best mover on the track and we just loved the horse," McDonald said. “He's very smooth and fluid and he galloped out easily. Betty owns Mushka, [a Grade 1-winning daughter of EMPIRE MAKER] so she's partial to EMPIRE MAKER. He just has all the ingredients."

"We're absolutely thrilled," said Smith, who paid $150,000 for the colt at the 2009 Keeneland September yearling sale in the name of Divine Assets, a small investment group. "The first time he walked by me at the sale he just spun me around, he was such a fluid mover. The consignors here are the best in the business and it's a great group of horses. You come down here and the cream of the crop rises. He's 15.3 [hands] in the stall but you put tack on him and he swells up like a 17-hand horse."

Date: 03 March 2010