David Futter is well-known for being an accomplished horseman, a hard grafter and a gregarious character, but the master of Yorton Farm in Powys is less famous for his scholarly statistical insights. He is surely happier with a lead rope than a calculator in his hands.

However, thanks to his son Riley diligently keeping records on a spreadsheet, he has some impressive facts and figures to share about the Goffs Yorton Sale, which returns after a one-year hiatus for its sixth edition at the farm on Thursday.

“We’ve sold 193 lots in the first five sales and 136 have run, or 70 per cent,” states Futter. “I think that’s pretty good, especially when you consider that includes some horses who were sold as yearlings in 2023, and are therefore still only just three.”

“Out of those 136 runners, 68 have won, at a strike-rate of bang on 50 per cent. That includes ten black-type performers and two Grade 1 winners, in Inthepocket and Redemption Day. The average price across those sales was just £27,400.”

The Goffs Yorton Sale has carved a niche for itself by offering mainly homebred or handpicked jump horses, most of whom were aged two, in an effort to encourage more owners, agents and trainers to do more with their charges when they are younger – which Futter and many of his peers think is key to French-bred success in this sphere.

He is therefore pleased to quote more splendid stats about the exploits of the auction’s graduates at the age of three.

“Out of the 136 runners, 46 competed as three-year-olds,” says Futter. “That’s 34 per cent, which I’m particularly proud of, especially when a lot of them went on to be offered at store sales and/or ran in point-to-points. Fifteen of those 46, or 48 per cent, won at three, and 27 of them, or 59 per cent, were placed at that age.

“I think that stat can be upgraded as well. We haven’t always put horses we think are going to excel at three, as we’ve had to accommodate the market, including point-to-point trainers who might want bigger horses who’ll peak a little later.”

The other figure that brings Futter immense satisfaction, and rightly so, is the 68 per cent of Goffs Yorton Sale winners being homebred or by the farm’s own sires.

“Everyone thinks they have to go with the fashionable sires, but we’ve not always stood the trendiest names, I’d be the first to admit that,” says Futter. “We landed on Blue Bresil, an outstanding sire who supplied the two Grade 1-winning graduates Inthepocket and Redemption Day, but many of the other stakes horses were by the other horses we’ve had, like Clovis Du Berlais, Gentlewave and Pether’s Moon.

“Most of the stallions we’ve had have been bought for small money relative to what is often paid in that market. I don’t want to beat my chest boasting, but we’re not half bad at identifying what might make it three or four years down the line, and even those that haven’t hit the big time have all produced sound, athletic stock.”

This year’s Goffs Yorton Sale catalogue features lots by resident sires old and new, including the mighty Blue Bresil and the late quiet overachiever Pether’s Moon, as well as the likes of Arrigo, Gentlewave, Ito, Linda’s Lad and Masterstroke.

“Martin Harris has just announced his figures for every horse that ran in British point-to-points last season ahead of their publication in the annual Point-to-Point and Hunter Chase Yearbook,” says Futter.

“He’s made one son of Masterstroke, Outmaster, the highest rated four-year-old point-to-pointer in Britain, and another son of Masterstroke, Great Valley, the leading five-year-old point-to-pointer in the country.

“It goes to show what Masterstroke can do, and it was well timed too, as we’ve got seven lots by the sire in our sale this week.”

The auction also features offspring of glamorous outside sires, including two sons of Doctor Dino who were sourced as yearlings at Arqana: one a half-brother to classy French hurdler Imperial Mag, out of the Silver Frost mare Cool La Mag, and the other a gelding out of Saint Grace, a winning daughter of broodmare sire extraordinaire Saint Des Saints, and from a black type-packed family to boot.

“We had to stretch a bit for those, but I hope we still got a bit of value – we’ll find out on Thursday,” says Futter. “The half-brother to Imperial Mag is also half-brother to Not Negotiable, who won a bumper on debut for Willie Mullins impressively, and the gelding out of Saint Grace is a full-brother to Doctor Du Mesnil, who also bolted up in a bumper on his first start for Willie in the spring.

“Doctor Dino keeps doing it. He had State Man still advertising him to good effect last season and then he got two new Grade 1 winners at the big spring festivals in Jade De Grugy and Murcia. There’s a reason he stands at €24,000.”

The Goffs Yorton Sale catalogue is also graced by progeny of elite or up-and-coming sires Walk In The Park, Jukebox Jury, Nathaniel and Cracksman.

All those lots are well-bred, too. The Walk In The Park is a filly out of a full-sister to Bravemansgame; the Jukebox Jury is a filly out of a winning Shantou full-sister to Super Duty; the Nathaniel is a filly out of a No Risk At All half-sister to Teahupoo; and the Cracksman is a half-brother to four winners out of Cheshire Oaks third Bright Approach, a half-sister to Nichols Canyon.

“Those four are being sold by Will Kinsey’s Peel Bloodstock and his partners in Future Bloodstock, they’re the only ones in the auction not owned by us,” explains Futter.

“Will’s come on board because we’ve worked together in one way or another, having mares in partnership or what-have-you, for 15 years or more and we have the same ethos when it comes to breeding and rearing, and trust each other implicitly.

“Trust is actually a big thing that we want to promote about this sale. Buyers should know that if we put a reserve on, and they bid that price, they’ll own the horse. It’s very transparent – anyone who wants to know the reserve can ask us.”

Another darker horse nominated by Futter as a potential standout in this year’s sale is a first-crop son of Wonderful Moon, a Group 2-winning son of Sea The Moon, from the family of Classic winners Meridiana and Miss Yoda.

“He’s a very nice horse,” he says in hushed tones. “We bought him in Baden-Baden as a yearling and he looks a proper racehorse. I think people will be surprised by how much they like him. You can get an early look now, as videos of all the horses on offer this week are up on our website.”

Futter is cognisant of the fact that he is transferring keep costs onto the buyer by offering only two-year-olds at the Goffs Yorton Sale, so has come up with a deal to mitigate those extra expenses.

“This year, for the first time, we’re offering the Yorton package,” he says. “That is, if anyone comes and wants to buy one or more of the two-year-olds on offer, but they don’t have the facilities to keep them until they go to the trainer, we will keep them here to be looked after, pre-trained, or whatever is required.

“We’ll do that for a one-off fee at a competitive rate, and it’ll be all-inclusive. There’ll be no livery bills or anything, so the buyer will know exactly what the cost is going to be over the six to three months their purchases are here.”

No-one could accuse Futter of not practising what he preaches when he has banged on about the need to provide some jumps horses with an earlier education in order to maintain pace with those raised in France, where it is de rigueur.

He has made the case in formal settings, on committees of industry bodies, and in informal situations, in speeches at awards ceremonies or face to face or on the phone. So, does he think all his campaigning is paying off?

“Lots of people in Britain have caught on,” he says. “Chris Barber recently put on social media a video of some of his two-year-olds already schooling and jumping, which is great. I rang him up to thank him for getting it out there.

“There’s a young point-to-point handler and pre-trainer who gets it. He’s getting off his backside and getting those horses educated and doing really well with it.

“But generally I do find it frustrating that six years after we launched the Goffs Yorton Sale with the idea of promoting doing more work with two-year-olds it still really hasn’t quite caught the imagination of more people in Britain.

“Many trainers do it, don’t get me wrong, but plenty don’t and I really think they’re missing a trick. It’s not the only way they have to bring horses along, they can still buy proven horses from France or the point-to-point field, but if they did it with some it could only be a positive thing.”

Can Futter put himself in the naysayers’ shoes, and see why they don’t do more with two-year-olds and keep them out in the field instead?

“Sure, it’s the same problem many of us have,” he says. “It needs good staff, time and money. Although I do think if they looked at the finances properly they would realise that the expense would even out. They would be buying raw material for a lot less money as yearlings and two-year-olds.

“They wouldn’t necessarily have to buy them in massive numbers, it could be just one or two each year, and they could introduce them into their systems gradually.

“I also think they underestimate how many owners would actually enjoy going on the journey of having a young horse and seeing it educated all the way to making its racing debut, if the process was explained to them and shown to them in a positive way. Some would love seeing their horse grow and gain confidence, and then graduate onto the racecourse.”

Futter has a pragmatic suggestion for increasing the appeal of Britain’s three-year-old development hurdles, which have been adopted in Ireland and given the natty name of academy hurdles, although it would require a little rule-bending.

“I feel that the powers-that-be should allow pre-trainers or point-to-point handlers some kind of licence that allows them to have runners in those National Hunt juvenile hurdles,” he says.

“As we all know, they’re the best at producing young horses. If they were allowed access to that shop window it would help them, it would help the initiative and it would help breeders by stimulating demand and finding out the quality of their breeding-stock more quickly.

“It would bring something to everyone’s table. We’ve all got to put our own interests to one side for the sake of the jumps industry in Britain.”

For all that Futter is a force of nature, he can’t control the BHA, so it remains to be seen whether they will be convinced.

He is in charge of his and his family’s destiny by holding the Goffs Yorton Sale, though, and is doing everything he can to make it a success.

“The main reason we created the sale was we wanted to paddle our own canoe,” he says. “We’re incredibly proud as a family to share those excellent stats after five years of sales. I think it says something about our selection process.

“I just hope the message gets through that with money so tight in the bloodstock market and wider world, you can come to our sale and spend a reasonable amount, anywhere from £5,000 to £40,000, and end up with an above-average horse.

“They’re buying from the source, after all. Most of the lots are homebred from our own sires, and so margins aren’t as tight as those for pinhookers or breeders. This is as good a bunch of horses as we’ve had, too. There’ll be proper value.”

One small bump in the road for this year’s renewal of the Goffs Yorton Sale is that it clashes with the BBAG Yearling Sale, which takes place only one day later in Baden Baden.

That is due to a quirk of the calendar this year, which also meant Britain’s summer bank holiday occurred on its earliest possible date in August.

Futter is unperturbed, however.

“We’ve had a lot of agents who are expecting to go to Baden Baden here already to inspect all the lots and they’ll be able to leave bids,” he says.

“We’ll definitely make sure the clash doesn’t happen again, though.”