Defining boutique: Torryburn Stud’s massive autumn

Cover image courtesy of The Image Is Everything

Idle Flyer (Dundeel {NZ})’s win in the G1 Queen Of The Turf Stakes caps a massive autumn for Torryburn Stud who bred the leading First Season Sire in Australia, Home Affairs, sire of this year’s G1 Golden Slipper winner Guest House.

Purchased for $70,000 from the Inglis Classic Yearling Sale draft of Torryburn Stud by Matthew Smith Racing and Randwick Bloodstock Agency, Idle Flyer is now the winner of eight races from 15 starts and has earnt more than $1.1 million in prizemoney.

Plenty of upside with Idle Flyer

Idle Flyer debuted as a July 2-year-old with a fifth placing before winning at her next start only a few days before the new season ticked over. She wasn’t seen again until the summer of her 3-year-old season, winning twice in Sydney. Back at four, she won her first two starts this season, before adding the G3 Angst Stakes.

“She just needed time but she always had plenty of ability we thought and it’s great to see her showing that now,” Torryburn’s Brett Cornish said. This autumn, she’s had three starts, running fourth in the G3 Wenona Girl Handicap when fresh, before winning the G1 Emancipation Stakes and G1 Queen Of The Turf Stakes.

“She’s really zoomed through the grades, she’s got a great turn of foot and to be fair, looks like she’s got plenty left in the tank. She was always a lovely filly but for whatever reason at the time, everybody seemed to be off Dundeel fillies so Matt and Mel (Smith) and Brett Howard got themselves another great value buy at Classic and look at her now.”

Trainer Matt Smith had been tasked with buying a few for the ownership group at the Inglis Classic Yearling Sale.

“(Owners) Lex and Sandy Tall gave us a few horses to look at at the Classic Sale and Brett Howard and myself went through them and by some fluke we came up with her and here we are today. Lex and Sandy, I’ve trained for them for 20 years so it’s great to get a good horse for them. This is what we get up in the morning for. It means a lot, it means everything to us,” trainer Matt Smith told inglis.com.au.

An impressive collection of Group 1 winners

For a small farm, Torryburn Stud produce an impressive number of stakes winners with 11 Group 1 winners since John Cornish and family purchased the farm in 2002. The majority of those have been recent with Home Affairs now retired but leading the First Season Sire Championship, while Idle Flyer and Voyage Bubble (Deep Field) are still racing.

“It's fantastic. I think that’s eight (Group 1 winners) in the last eight years. We probably needed a new poster horse, but we've got one now,” said Torryburn Stud’s Mel Copelin.

Home Affairs hit headlines this year when his first crop son Guest House won the G1 Golden Slipper. Torryburn Stud sold Home Affairs to Tom Magnier for $875,000 at the COVID-affected Inglis Easter Yearling Sale of 2020. Winner of the G2 Todman Stakes at two, he added the G1 Coolmore Stud Stakes and G1 Lightning Stakes at three.

“When I was packing for Easter. I had the Home Affair signs and I said to the staff, ‘Maybe he's had enough (advertising). We'll just leave him at home.’ And then he sired the Slipper winner, so I pulled the signs back out and they went back on the truck! It's been a couple of good wins, all in the space of a month.”

The Queen Of The Turf has been good to Torryburn Stud in the past few years. Dixie Blossoms (Street Sense {USA}) won the 2019 G1 Coolmore Classic, and was second in the G1 Queen Of The Turf.

“We also had Hope In Your Heart who was second in this race,” said Copelin. Hope In Your Heart (Dundeel {NZ}) was second to Atishu (NZ) (Savabeel) in 2023, and her best win came that same autumn in the G2 Guy Walter Stakes.

Espiona (Extreme Choice) won the 2023 G1 Coolmore Classic, and in 2021, Hot King Prawn (Denman) won the G1 HKJC Centenary Sprint Cup, to join the others as Group 1 winners in the last decade off the pastures at Torryburn Stud.

Another strong year was in 2018 when El Dorado Dreaming (Ilovethiscity) won the G1 Sires’ Produce Stakes and Miss Wilson (Stratum) won the G1 New Zealand Thoroughbred Breeders’ Stakes. The results are impressive given the size of Torryburn Stud’s broodmare band.

“We only have about 25 of our own and 10 mares for clients. We try. We'll keep trying. You’ve always got to keep working, keep plugging away when things go wrong. Mares can be quite fragile, you know. You think you’ve got something there, then you’ll lose them or something bad will happen. But so far, it's been a good start to the year and hopefully it continues.”

Progressive has been the perfect broodmare

Broodmare infertility is a bane of every breeder’s life, but occasionally a broodmare comes along who has no issues. Progressive (Street Cry {Ire}) was sold by Godolphin at the 2016 Magic Millions National Broodmare Sale for $325,000 to Belmont Bloodstock after a racing career where she won four times, including twice in Sydney.

“She's been very faithful mare. She's had nine foals in a row. Never missed, never given us any grief. And this spring when she foaled in late October, a beautiful Tassort colt, we thought we’d give her a break and see where she sat (coming into the new season). The Tassort was supposed to be a Castelvecchio. But the day we went to get covered, he got injured,” said Copelin.

“We knew Idle Flyer was a good filly, and now we’ve got a couple of months to work out where we send her. She's a very healthy mare, very sound mare, but after having the nine foals, we thought was time for her to have a break. She’s been good at the sales too, so we can’t really ask much more of her.”

Idle Flyer is Progressive's cheapest yearling, at $70,000, while 5-year-old gelding Influential (The Autumn Sun) cost Chris Waller and Guy Mulcaster Bloodstock $400,000 at the Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale. Fourth in the Listed The Phoenix Stakes at two, he’s won twice and is currently racing in Brisbane for trainer Jimmy Downes.

“We've got a long term partner in the mare, who has been friends with the Cornish’s for thirty years. They’ve raced horses together for a long time. It’s really exciting for them, as they’ve now bred a Group 1 winner. They were in the ownership of Presently, and he's now 27, and he's still here at the farm,” said Copelin. Presently (Unbridled’s Song {USA}) was born in 1998 and won 10 races including four Listed races.

Torryburn Stud were given a strong hint that Idle Flyer had plenty to come, when one of her owners approached the farm with an offer to buy Progressive. This year, the same ownership group purchased Progressive’s Harry Angel (Ire) filly at the Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale for $200,000.

“It's very exciting for the (racing) ownership group, and Lex (Tall) bought the Harry Angel off us at Magic Millions so that’s nice. We had an inkling Idle Flyer would be good, as he had already tried to buy the mare,” said Copelin.

“She's big and strong, probably stronger than most Street Cry mares. She's quite wide between chest, with a beautiful hind end on her. Obviously, we paid 300 and something for her. She’s a beautiful mare, and she throws nice looking foals. She’s beautifully bred.”

Progressive is a full sister to four-time Sydney winner Transfers, the dam of Group 1 winner Tom Kitten (Harry Angel {Ire}) and stakes winners Va Via (Astern) and Promotions (Exceed and Excel). Her dam, Movin’ Out (Encosta De Lago) is a city-winning half-sister to Group 3 winner Murjana (Giant’s Causeway {USA}).

“She went to Snitzel and The Autumn Sun, we went (initially) with Danehill line stallions, then we’ve gone to some Danehill-free stallions. Do we go back to Dundeel, or do we pick something younger because she’s an older mare? So maybe a lovely first season sire would be the way to go,” mused Copelin.

“We bought her because she's got a gorgeous pedigree. She's actually really fun to mate because she's got beautiful female lines. You can find some really good duplications with lots of stallions, namely Special with Dundeel. So that was the reason behind that.”

With damsires Street Cry (Ire), Encosta De Lago, and Danehill (USA), and tracing back to Dancing Show (USA) (Ninjisky {Can}) who is Progressive’s third dam, this is one of Australia’s best families. Dancing Show is the dam of Group 1 winners and sires Umatilla (NZ) and Hurricane Sky, as well as Shantha’s Choice (Canny Lad), the dam of Redoute’s Choice and Manhattan Rain, and this is the dynasty that includes Al Maher, Marhoona, Schwarz, Rubick, Shoals, and many others.

“We bought three mares from that sale Magic Millions sale. Imperial Lass, who is the dam of Straight Arron, Serena Miss who we’ve since sold again but she’s the dam of Group 3-placed Sentimental that we race, and Progressive. So it was a successful shopping trip.”

Dundeel soft in the marketplace

Dundeel (NZ) has a reputation for being a colts-stallion, something that is common with sons of High Chaparral (Ire), and when Idle Flyer went to the Inglis Classic Yearling Sale in 2023, he had yet to sire a filly Group 1 winner.

Even now, he has 10 Group 1 winners, with Idle Flyer and Femminile being the only two fillies on the list. Femminile won the 2025 G1 South Australian Derby, two years after Idle Flyer went to market.

“She was nice enough (as a yearling). We’ve bred to Dundeel every year since he's started at stud. The year before, we sold Mare Of Mt Buller for $250,000. So we’ve sold some nice ones.” Winner of the G3 Epona Stakes, Mare Of Mt Buller has earnings over $700,000 for her five victories.

“That year (2021) we had three Dundeel fillies born, Idle Flyer, one was a full sister to Mare Of Mt Buller and the other was out of Miss Interiors.” Miss Interiors (Flying Spur) is the dam of Home Affairs.

“The market was a little bit off them at that point. People had worked out they were a little difficult to get along with, but still good racehorses. Anyway, if people don’t want to pay more, you've got to accept it, and the right judge found her,” said Copelin.

“We made a lot of money the year before out of the Dundeels and sometimes you just have to accept how it goes. You can't make people pay more. The main thing is that they get into the right stables and they do what they do.

“And at the end of the day, it really doesn't matter what we get for them because you can get all the money you like, but if they don't run, no one's going to buy horses off you. So we couldn't be happier.”