adrian nicoll
Golden years
Martin Stevens grabs a snapshot of the last 50 years of the bloodstock industry with Adrian Nicoll, who this year celebrated his half century as a bloodstock agent with BBA Ireland
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Photography courtesy of Tattersalls and Coolmore
T MAY have been 50 years ago, but Adrian Nicoll can still vividly recall his successful job application to work at BBA Ireland. It helps that the occasion was set against the backdrop of one of the greatest equine feats on the Irish
Turf. Nicoll, the son of Olympic bronze medalwinning show jumper Henry, was 21 and based in South Africa but holidaying in Britain when BBA agent Sir Mordaunt Milner gave him word that the company’s Irish arm was looking for new blood. So Nicoll met BBA Ireland’s legendary founder Tom Cooper at Royal Ascot in 1970, with Cooper inviting the young horseman to Kildare for a formal interview at a time of his choosing. Nicoll opted for the following Saturday when Nijinsky would attempt to become only the third colt to complete the English and Irish Derby double reasoning that, if he didn’t get the job, at least he’d have seen a good horserace. Nijinsky stormed to victory at The Curragh and Nicoll got the job. Both went on to exert an influence on the thoroughbred breed. Nijinsky, of course, sealed the English Triple Crown by winning the St Leger and then siring champions such as Caerleon, Ferdinand, Golden Fleece, Kings Lake, Lammtarra, Shadeed and Shahrastani. Nicoll, meanwhile, played a part in organising the first stallion shuttles to Australia and continued to do so until the
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1980s, when the momentous deal to send Danehill down under was struck. He has also purchased numerous Group 1 winners and their dams in both hemispheres. Nicoll is no longer a partner in BBA Ireland, having sold his stake in the company in recent years, but he might be called an emeritus BBA Ireland agent. And although he has wound down a little, he still buys horses for a select number of clients in Europe and Australia. “I started in the pedigree department, as most people do when they join a bloodstock agency,” Nicolls remembers of his introduction to life at BBA Ireland. “Then I went onto nominations, and that was a different world to what we know now. “In those days we managed something like 20 stallions at 20 different stud farms. And the stallions were covering 45 or 50 mares - 40 for shareholders and five or ten for the stud. All that diversity has gone. The two main stallions at the time were Red God at Loughtown Stud and Sovereign Path at Burgage. “I was also being shown the ropes at the December sales in the early days. Tom Cooper was a great mentor, no doubt about that. He was a marvellous judge of horses and renowned for his integrity. He was far too young when he died at only 64.” A big turning point in Nicoll’s career came in 1974 when he accompanied Jonathan Irwin, a partner in BBA Ireland until he left to run Goffs when the auction house moved to Kildare the following year, on a trip to
