Amo Racing boss Kia Joorabchian hopes the purchase of Sir Michael Stoute's Freemason Lodge and his recent wave of sales can improve the health of British racing.
Joorabchian made a bid to buy the Newmarket yard last month with a view to securing a larger site for his Amo training center, which will be overseen by Raphael Freire of the 38-stall Felstead Court Stables in Lambourn.
Joorabchian said: “We hope to be ready by early January and we are very excited and honored to have achieved it.”
“We needed something like this because our situation at Lambourn was no longer very good for us. It worked for the first few years when we dipped our toes in the water, and that’s when the business grew.”
“We’re not really going to change the structure of the operation. We kept maybe 40 horses at Lambourn and next year we might keep 50 at Freemason. We will continue with our coaching group, but Raphael has definitely outgrown Lambourn.” . When this opportunity came, we couldn’t turn it down.”
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Freemason Lodge will be another colossal outlay for Joorabchian, who spent more than £24m on 25 fresh recruits, eight of them in partnership with others, in the first book of the Yearling Sale in October.
He also went for a record 2.5 million guineas as the sister of the 2023 Two Thousand Guineas (G1) winner Chaldean at the December foal sale at Tattersalls and hopes his actions can create a buzz in the industry and spark more investment in British racing.
Speaking on Charlie Fellowes and George Scott's Off The Bridle podcast, he said: “I'm really looking forward to next year because I hope we can show other people that they can do it too; by injecting money into the business.” For me in particular, it is very significant that British racing is suffering at the moment.
“It's suffering with the adolescent talent, it's suffering with the prize money, it's suffering with the viewership and I think if we can breathe a little life into it then I hope we've created some excitement for everyone, including them Guys we have.” With the ones we work with and the ones we don’t, the excitement will pay off.
“We’re trying to get a lot of people involved. As you've seen in the past, we've had some football players involved with horses, we've hopefully had a few Americans, and some we're now partners with, people like Valmont and Al Shaqab, who we share horses with have bought.
“I hope that this type of thing creates more excitement, brings in more money and in the end I hope that we can get these racetracks back to a level where we can compete and people don't have to say, 'Hey, let's go to France.' 'Cause the girl is worth 30 grand.' That’s the ultimate goal, moving the sport forward.”
While Freire is an significant cog in the Amo wheel, Joorabchian recently added Sir Mark Prescott and Scott to his training squad. Scott enjoyed the victories in Group 2 Jura Island And Bay City Scooter in the best season of his career in 2024, and the owner believes in the need to nurture fresh talent.
He said: “A lot of people looked at me when I gave a adolescent trainer a horse that cost a lot of money to sell, but if you never give these guys a chance, how do you know if they will?” to reach? Most of these trainers cannot balance the product.
“I have a few older coaches and it was a nice moment when I went to see Sir Mark Prescott the other day. He was fabulous and I just wondered why I had never had a horse with him. He started the conversation with, “I just mixed up the age of your coaches!”
Joorabchian also plans to build stronger bloodstock links in the UK and he added: “I would like to start my breeding business in the UK – that is my main concern. The more we can start breeding here, the more enthusiasm we can generate. “The better we are.”
