You see a yearling and you love the yearling, but then you see the x-ray and you are given pause for thought - what happens next?
This week on Tara Talks Racing we had Scott Darby on to chat about his amazing day last Saturday at Randwick with high profile wins for Darby Racing’s Robusto and Within the Law. During the course of a wide-ranging conversation with myself and Craig ‘Clocker’ Tompson the subject of Overpass came up.
He’s the current flagbearer for Darby Racing and the six year-old gelding by Vancouver from Walkway has won 10 races and over $9.7million with highlight victories in the Group I WATC Winterbottom Stakes twice and the lucrative slot race The Quokka twice.
Overpass was purchased from Inglis Easter in the COVID year by Darby Racing from Corumbene Stud for $75,000, but was a horse Scott Darby very nearly walked away from.
Inglis was hit hard by COVID that year with the main catalogue offered as an online sale in April (when Home Affairs was sold) and then for vendors who did not wish to sell online and were happier to wait, a catalogue of 100 lots was to be offered at the complex in July and was the first live thoroughbred sale in Australia post the crisis.
54 of 83 lots offered were sold at an average $129,093 and the clearance rate of 65% spoke volumes for the uncertainty of the time, but out of the murky waters Scott Darby and his team emerged with a horse to change lives.
“So that was the second part of the Easter sale where you could turn up on the complex, because we definitely saw him in the flesh,” Scott Darby recalled.
“There’s a bit of a story with him. We loved him as a type, but Vancouver was really starting to be on the nose and he did have a little chip in the hind fetlock, which is no big deal, but the vet said you want to syndicate him. You're going to have to get that pulled out first.
“Our team loved him, but I said we really don't need to buy a horse like this and have to wait three months for him to have the little chip taken out.
“My business partner Mark (Holland) was adamant, ‘Look, we’ve got to buy it.’”
Mark Newnham was training for Darby Racing at the time before his departure to Hong Kong and Scott was thinking the colt would go to him given he had trained two of his previous siblings, but Newnham was not keen.
“I said to Mark we found this really nice horse. Would you be interested in training? And he said no,” said Darby.
“He said the other two are no good at all and Mark was very definite like that like that, and we loved him for it. There was no mucking around.
“Then Bjorn (Baker) happened to walk past.. ‘I love that horse, boss’ so I said well, if we get it, you can have it because Mark doesn't want it…. And the rest is history.
“I could've easily overruled our team and said ‘You know, we don't need to be buying a horse that we're going to have to wait months to syndicate’ but we bought him anyway.
“We got him home, took the chip out and re-vetted him and sold him and his first win was at Orange… can you believe it!”
Overpass followed up with additional wins at Warwick Farm and Gosford in his juvenile season and has improved with every single preparation since then.
“I say to the owners, it doesn't matter where you start, it's where you finish and half the fun is going up through the grades,” Darby reflected.
“Once you get to the top, it's pretty hard to stay there and keep winning unless you are Winx or Black Caviar, so I always say make sure you enjoy that ride.”
With 10 wins and five seconds from 29 starts and $9.7million in the bank, the ride on Overpass is not over yet!
To hear the full interview with Scott Darby have a listen to our podcast Tara Talks Racing.
