POMONA, Calif. - A $2 million Awesome Again filly, a half-sister to the impressive 3-year-old filly Madcap Escapade, set a new world record for a 2-year-old filly as sale-topper at the Barretts March select juvenile auction Tuesday afternoon.
John Ferguson, agent for Sheikh Mohammed al Maktoum, signed for the filly, who is out of the stakes-winning Saratoga Six mare Sassy Pants. Jerry Bailey, agent, sold the sale-topper. She had cost just $75,000 as a 2003 Keeneland September yearling.
POMONA, Calif. - The Barretts March select juvenile sale, bolstered this year by racing-age stock from The Thoroughbred Corp., got under way Tuesday afternoon with a $1.35 million early session leader in La Canada winner Cat Fighter.
John Sikura, owner of Hill 'n' Dale Farm in Lexington, Ky., signed the ticket for Cat Fighter, a 3-year-old Storm Cat filly out of Grade 2 winner Strategic Maneuver.
MIAMI - Only the dead were unaware of the heavy-hitters among the juveniles available at the Fasig-Tipton select sale of 2-year-olds in training at Calder on Tuesday. Yet the confluence of buyers with seemingly limitless budgets and a couple of dozen very exciting young prospects sent prices to unprecedented heights.
The world's record for a 2-year-old in training was broken not once, but twice, in the one-day session, and both the colts, one selling for $3.1 million and the second for $4.5 million, seem outstanding young athletes for racing both this year and next.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - Florida's two select juvenile auctions launched the 2-year-old sale season in extraordinary style, and the question now is whether the March 2 Barretts auction, which features a dispersal of The Thoroughbred Corporation bloodstock, can keep the boom going.
Graeme Hall (by Dehere out of Win Crafty Lady, by Crafty Prospector) entered stud last year, and when the breeding season ended, the multiple Grade 2 stakes-winning millionaire had covered 77 mares. "We have 16 on the ground already," said Phil Hronec, manager of Winding Oaks Farm, where Graeme Hall stands, "and I could not be more pleased with their appearance."
ARCADIA, Calif. - There may be a future state champion lurking among the 24 California-breds that will sell at Tuesday's Barretts March Sale of selected 2-year-olds in-training in Pomona.
In two of the last three years, the California-breds offered in the sale have included a 2-year-old who went on to win a championship - Officer in 2001 and House of Fortune last year.
Officer was bought for $700,000 by The Thoroughbred Corporation at the 2001 Barretts March Sale and went on to win the Del Mar Futurity and Champagne Stakes that year. He now stands at stud in Kentucky.
New York sire Manlove is keeping good company at the top of the current list of leading grass sires of 2004.
Manlove, who stands at Liberty Stud Farm in Ghent for $3,000, is in second place on the list with $332,550 in progeny earnings with his turf runners and is surrounded by stallions whose stud fees are significantly higher. California sire In Excess, who tops the list, stands for $25,000. Theatrical, third behind Man-love, stands in Kentucky for $75,000, and another Kentucky sire, Royal Academy, fourth on the list, stands for $20,000.
Shine Again, a million-dollar earning mare bred by Mrs. Richard C. duPont, tops the list of 2003 Maryland-bred champions announced Friday by the Maryland Horse Breeders Association.
Shine Again (by Wild Again-Shiner, by Two Punch), the fourth generation of her family foaled and raised at duPont's Woodstock Farm in Chesapeake City, was named horse of the year, champion older female, and champion sprinter.
Other divisional champions are: