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James Harron spent $8 million on colts at yearling sales earlier this year, and he couldn't have dreamt of a better way to start their careers than to watch Capitalist lead home a quinella in the Breeders' Plate at Randwick on Saturday.
The bloodstock agent backed himself and found a group of owners, including Newgate farm, John Ingham and Belinda Bateman, to buy colts in the hope of finding a stallion.
"They took a leap of faith with me and that is a great start. You want to have colts in this race but to have Capitalist and Detective run the quinella it is a relief," Harron said. "We have 24 overall from a range of different stallions.
"We went to the sales looking for types that would make stallions and we are happy with what we got. This bloke has looked the goods from the start and proved it today. We have had a good talk about where these colts could go and he is a Magic Millions horse."
The Peter and Paul Snowden-trained Capitalist sat three-wide with cover behind the leader and pulled out into the clear turning for home. He loomed up at the 300m mark and when Blake Shinn slipped him some rein he raced away.
He ran 57.09 seconds, just outside Murtajill's race record, easing up to win by three lengths from Detective, with Prized Icon a half-length back in third.
"He's an athlete, a real natural with a great attitude. He made my job extremely easy, a pleasure to ride," Shinn said. "He is just going to get better."
Peter Snowden, who trains all 24 colts for the group, has hinted there was more to come.
"James put the pressure on himself to put this together. He has given us great types and the pressure is on us to get the job [done] with some nice horses," Snowden said.
"It was James' leg work, I only went for the final inspections and all I could do was keep smiling."
Capitalist was a $165,000 purchase at the Magic Millions and his preparation will be tailored to that but he got a taste of what racing is about on Saturday.
"He got in a bit of a scrimmage at the 600, but he balanced up and travelled like a winner a long way out, Snowden said.
"He put paid to them without any pressure at all. I was very, very impressed by that run and we think he is a horse of the future. [Detective] did a good job today and he's got good natural ability. There's no guarantee, but there's some really, really nice horses there. It's a great start."
