Operated by Bruce Slade, Kestrel is a bloodstock consultancy business based in Australia.
Day in, day out, we strive to deliver long term competitive advantages to thoroughbred businesses through our range of services. We believe the best businesses deliver the most value to their customers. For us energy, empathy and integrity is everything.
Bruce Slade has spent the last decade in leadership roles at two of Australia’s most successful bloodstock businesses – Gai Waterhouse Racing and more recently Henry Field’s Newgate Farm.
2010-2014: As bloodstock manager for Gai Waterhouse, Bruce was tasked with attracting, selecting, sourcing, purchasing, & syndicating 120+ yearling per annum (over 1800 clients and $10m in yearling sale purchases) into the stable as future racehorses. The performance of the business relied heavily on the quality of athlete secured, and you can read about the top class racehorses Bruce has been involved with in the Success section of this website.
2015-2019: As Director of Stallions and Sales, and then as General Manager for Newgate Farm, Bruce oversaw all aspects of this leading stallion stud farm based in the Hunter Valley, whilst driving the income generating stallion and consignment segments of the business. Newgate’s stallion nominations and consignment businesses generated over $25m in sales per annum and serviced over 1100 clients.
2020 – current: Since launching Kestrel Thoroughbreds, Bruce has worked closely with the only two operations he worked for since arriving in Australia; Newgate Stud predominantly in their stallion business, and Adrian Bott and Gai Waterhouse Racing on the bloodstock and sales side of the business. Since joining as a consultant, the Newgate team have grown into the largest stallion business by number of mares covered in the Southern Hemisphere. Adrian and Gai meanwhile in the 2022/23 and 2023/24 racing seasons have trained the winners of more prizemoney and stakes races than any previous racing season. Both organisations have incredible teams who have made this happen and we are grateful to have the opportunity to work with them.
In this time Bruce has also advised the bloodstock portfolios of Allam Bloodstock and Nocab Racing who have since built amongst Australia’s best boutique broodmare bands, and stallion equity positions.