Guy Mulcaster

From there their careers diverge, one decides that training is the life for him, the other is more interested in the breeding side.

From different parts of New Zealand (Foxton and Hawke’s Bay) they didn’t know each other but fast forward a couple of decades and the team of Chris Waller and Guy Mulcaster is a formidable one, their success highlighted by the deeds of the superstar mare Winx. “I met Chris at the sales, he was starting off as a trainer and I was starting off as a bloodstock agent,” Mulcaster recalled.

And now they head to yearling sales in partnership, Mulcaster doing the initial ground work spending considerable time at studs and sales seeing horses around the country and beyond. “I do the first inspections and narrow them down,” he explained. “Chris takes a look at those, we have a chat and work out which ones we want to buy. Most of the time our opinions are similar, Chris knows what sort of horses he can train and he doesn’t really go off beat in regards to the sires of yearlings he buys. He has the final say on the horses he buys and I have the final say on the horses I buy for my other clients.”

Whilst Waller spent his apprenticeship years with Paddy Busuttin, Mulcaster was learning all that he could from Paul O’Sullivan, Michael Moroney and Laurie Laxon. He’d previously worked at stables and studs during school holidays having ‘got the bug’ from his father, a farmer who’d had success racing a few horses. Training was considered but “I think the early mornings and the way in which, in New Zealand, when you get a good horse it is often sold underneath you, well I thought bloodstock was the safer job.”

And so Mulcaster worked at New Zealand Bloodstock for a decade, 15 years ago establishing is own business. He educated himself by going to the sales, “inspecting, keeping lists and seeing how those horses turned out,” and along the way he met people who would become his associates and clients.

“You get to know a lot of people in that career and it carries on from there.”

At a time when Raffles Farm’s Bruce Sherwin was Macau based, Mulcaster had a bit of early success buying horses who fared well there and in Hong Kong. And with bloodstock being ‘a results driven business,’ Mulcaster was off and running and the more winners that flowed, the more respect he gained.

“It’s all about having the clients willing to spend the money,” he said, pointing to Winx as one example. “I was lucky enough to have the people who firstly had enough to buy her and secondly who were happy to spend that money on a horse who was not an early type. She was a rangy yearling,” he called, “a little bit weak; but she always had that good athletic stride.”

Mulcaster obviously kept a close eye on the career of that $230,000 Magic Millions graduate and he puts down her trip to Queensland as being ‘the making of her.’ “Being up there in the better weather, I think that turned the corner for her.”

That it certainly did, Winx’s memorable win in the Sunshine Coast Guineas-Gr3, 1600m was the first of her memorable streak of 33. “The more she raced the more she furnished and the better she got,” he said, adding that “she was a very good horse with the right application.” Mulcaster admires the job Waller did with Winx, not only in regards to managing her career but also the associated pressures. “He had cameras on him the whole time, he couldn’t just poke along and do what he usually did, he had to be mindful of the media’s take on things.”

The year Winx was purchased, 2013, was a particularly successful one for Mulcaster who also found through that same Magic Millions sales ring the classy filly Amicus. Chris Waller Racing secured that daughter of Fastnet Rock and the stakes placed Gold Chant (a half-sister to Starspangledbanner) for $500,000 and the Tony Santic bred filly proved to be a good buy winning five races including the 1000 Guineas-Gr1, 1600m, the Let’s Elope Stakes- Gr2, 1400m, the ATC Breeders Classic-Gr2, 1200m and the Toy Show Quality-Gr3, 1300m.

“Three years after buying her we sold her to Ireland where she has done a great job, one of her sons ran third in the Melbourne Cup,” he noted. That being last year’s Moonee Valley Cup-Gr2, 2500m winner Okita Soushi who was so brave at Flemington beaten less than a length. Now a member of the Ciaron Maher stable, he is the first foal for Amicus who has subsequently produced the Gallinule Stakes- Gr3, 2012m winner Chief Little Rock, another son of Galileo.

The Coolmore owned mare is back in Australia, served last spring by Wootton Bassett after foaling a filly by St Mark’s Basilica whilst her previous foal, a son of Frankel, fetched $500,000 at last year’s Magic Millions National Weanling Sale. Mulcaster also had great success in 2013 at Karaka, at the New Zealand Bloodstock National Yearling Sale buying, with Chris Waller, Preferment and for another client, Kermadec.

“He was a big staying horse who did a good job winning the VRC Derby at his seventh start,” Mulcaster said of Preferment, the $190,000 purchase who went on to win another four Group 1 races. And of Kermadec who was bought for $260,000 he said “he was a nice horse off a good farm and I was fortunate to have Neville Morgan ready to buy all of him.” That horse also found stakes winning form early, at his third outing taking out the Carbine Club Stakes-Gr3, 1600m at Flemington on Derby Day.

Going on to elite level stakes in the George Main Stakes-Gr1, 1600m and the Doncaster Handicap-Gr1m 1600m he was snapped up for stud duties by Darley and from his Northwood Park base has proven to be a reliably classy stallion represented by four Group 1 winners.

Kermadec is not the only Mulcaster/Morgan success story as they have also combined to buy two winners of the Queensland Derby-Gr1, 2400m; the 2021 winner Kukeracha (Karaka, $130,000) and the 2023 winner Kovalica (Karaka, $110,000) as well as Kolding, a $170,000 Karaka buy who won three majors, the Epsom Handicap-Gr1, 1600m, the George Main Stakes and the All-Aged Stakes-Gr1, 1400m.

Mulcaster was famously back in action at this year’s Karaka Sale where he broke not only the sale’s record but his own with his most expensive purchase to date, again teaming with Chris Waller for a successful bid of $2.4 million on an eye-catching sister to the New Zealand Derby-Gr1, 2400m and Vinery Stud Stakes-Gr1, 2000m winner Orchestral. He hopes she can live up to the deeds of other talented gallopers he has spied as yearlings, others on his purchasing resume including the four time Group 1 winner Sacred Falls (Karaka, $160,000), the dual Group 1 winning sprinter Sacred Star (Inglis Easter, $200,000), the Auckland Cup-Gr1, 3200m victor Rock Diva (Karaka, $200,000), the JJ Atkins Stakes-Gr1, 1600m winner Sacred Elixir (Karaka, $170,000) and the Darley Classic-Gr1, 1200m winner Delectation (Easter, $250,000).

And of course Arrowfield Stud’s emerging star The Autumn Sun, the five time Group 1 winner bought with Waller and Hermitage Thoroughbreds for $700,0000 at Easter 2017.

Mulcaster said he cannot ‘really explain’ exactly what he sees in a potential star but he likes them to ‘be an athlete.’ “It’s about what you see in your own mind, how the horse moves, their shape. You get to know their families and try to envisage what sort of horse they are likely to grow into. And you have to know your values, there is no point showing a $200,000 horse to someone who has $100,000 to spend. Most horses at sales sell,” he continued, “and there are so many different opinions. Some buy a $10,000 horse and have great success, others spend $1 million on a slow horse and all shades in between.”

Outside of the yearling sales ring Mulcaster has had plenty of success spotting diamonds amongst raced horses and he enjoys a yearling trip to the Autumn Horses In Training Sale at Tattersalls. From there he has sourced such talented performers as the triple Group 1 winner Foreteller (100,000gns), the Kingston Town Classic-Gr1, 1800m winner Moriarty (90,000gns) and the Sydney Cup-Gr1, 3200m winner Stand To Gain (105,000gns). “I’ve been to that sale 17 years in a row,” he said, noting that the challenge of buying a good tried horse has increased.

“It has been getting a bit harder. A lot of horses are sold during the year now and you have buyers from a lot of countries like Bahrain and Saudi Arabia competing for the same horses.”

Mulcaster has experience on his side however, noting that “you get to know the tracks these horses have been racing at and the sort of competition they’ve had. The value that was there ten years ago has dried up a bit but we still got three nice horses last year.” Those horses being the lightly raced (twice placed from four starts) Man Of Worth by Sea The Stars (80,000gns), the three time winner (from his last four starts) Hutchence by Frankel (460,000gns) and the Awtaad gelding Tazima (210,000gns) who was successful at his second outing last spring.

Mulcaster also has what he calls ‘a side play,’ each year picking out three of for yearling suitable for pin-hooking. “It’s the same process in regards to inspection,” he said, “looking for a nicely shaped athlete but you are mindful that they are going to have to come some pressure to be ready for the ready-to-run sales, they are not far away. I’ve had a bit of success, not paying too much and selling on well.”

Mulcaster, who has based himself on the Gold Coast for the last three years, certainly works hard and is constantly on the go from December 1 onwards. “That’s when I start looking at the Magic Millions horses who I see again at the sales. Soon after that it is New Zealand, then the Classic, Perth, Melbourne, Adelaide, back to the Gold Coast in March then Easter in Sydney. And the broodmare sales take us through to July, it is pretty full on! After that I concentrate on Europe.”

Rarely getting to the track except for the occasional day for ‘the social aspect,’ Mulcaster is happy to watch the action unfold on screen though he did enjoy being on course for “eight or ten of Winx’s wins.”

He has a preference for buying yearlings by commercial stallions, noting that “you have to ring a buyer and it helps if they know who their sire is, it makes them easier to sell. If there is a young horse I really like I talk it through and tell clients why I like that horse so much.” Two such stallions are on Mulcaster’s radar at the moment, he being a fan of Wootton Bassett and Home Affairs.

“We’ve had a big go at Wootton Bassett over the last couple of years and that is working out well for us. I’d been following him in Europe and liked that he was on an upward curve and it is great that he ended up standing here.”

“Home Affairs was a good racehorse and they look pretty fast; they have good bone and substance.”

No doubt that amongst any talented gallopers sired by either of those two stallions will be horses who were signed up for by Guy Mulcaster. Which can be another story for another day!

The two farm boys from New Zealand have done pretty well and Guy Mulcaster is looking forward to finding more winners for Chris Waller and his other clients. BBBB