$3.55 million Bernardini colt breaks Fasig-Tipton Midlantic 2-year-olds in training sale record

A $3.55 million Bernardini colt smashed the sale record for highest price as the Fasig-Tipton Midlantic 2-year-olds in training sale concluded with strong figures Tuesday at the Maryland State Fairgrounds in Timonium.

Fasig-Tipton reported 391 horses sold over two days for gross receipts of $37,297,700. That bettered the sale record of $33,692,000, established from 357 sold last year.

The cumulative average price was a record $95,391, ticking upward 1 percent from the prior high-water mark of $94,375 last year.

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The median price did dip 6 percent, to $47,000 from the record $50,000 established last year. The median is considered a key figure for market health, as it represents a broader swath of the activity, and is not influenced as much by outliers at the top of the marketplace as the average price can be. The buyback rate was 19 percent, respectable against last year’s 16 percent.

Consignor Jimbo Gladwell of Top Line Sales spoke to the activity at the top of the marketplace.

“When you jump through the hoops and vet good, when you do the work and have a pretty horse on the end of the shank, people are willing to give a lot more money for them than in years past, and they just seem to stack up on the same horses,” Gladwell said. “The ones that make the cut and are what they think are the good ones, they will really step in there and take a big swing at them.”

Bloodstock agent and clocker Gary Young, bidding for Amr Zedan’s Zedan Racing, took the biggest swing to secure the sale topper, named Berning Remarks. Young bid with Bob Baffert, the regular trainer for Zedan, in attendance. Baffert, who handled the star-crossed Medina Spirit for Zedan, is serving a 90-day suspension that runs through July 2.

Young, Baffert, and Zedan also teamed up to buy Medina Spirit for $35,000 at the 2020 OBS July sale of 2-year-olds, and Princess Noor, the most expensive juvenile of 2020, at $1.35 million.

The trip through the ring by the Bernardini colt, who is from the third-to-last crop by the late Eclipse Award champion, had been anticipated since he blitzed a furlong in 9 4/5 seconds on the five-furlong dirt track at Timonium during the under-tack show. The work was the fastest at this sale since 2012.

The colt’s price smashed the previous Midlantic record $1.8 million, which Michael Lund Petersen paid in 2019 for Gamine, eventually an Eclipse Award champion. The Bernardini colt is the highest-priced 2-year-old sold in North America since Cezanne, a multiple graded stakes winner, fetched $3.65 million at the 2019 Fasig-Tipton Gulfstream sale, pre-pandemic. According to Fasig-Tipton records, the colt is also the highest-priced horse sold at public auction in Maryland, and the highest-priced horse sold at public auction worldwide by Bernardini.

“Anything can happen at Timonium, and it just did,” Fasig-Tipton Midlantic sales director Paget Bennett said. “It just goes to show people can feel confident about bringing that type of horse to the marketplace here in Maryland.”

The New York-bred colt was consigned by Becky Thomas’s Sequel Bloodstock, as agent for Chester and Mary Broman, perennial leading breeders in the Empire State.

“The expectations were pretty high,” Sequel assistant Carlos Manresa said of the colt’s outstanding breeze. “Like most of the Bromans’ horses, they’re bred to go fast, and he did just that. We didn’t know he was going to go quite that fast – we hadn’t asked him to go that fast. But we knew he would be a standout performer.

“We had huge expectations, and he exceeded them.”

The colt is out of the winning Medaglia d’Oro mare G Note, dam of three winners from as many starters. G Note is out of Grade 2 winner Seeking the Ante, who is out of Grade 1 winner Antespend, dam of Grade 1 winner Friends Lake. Seeking the Ante produced stakes winner Minerologist, dam of stakes winner Can You Diggit. Seeking the Ante also produced Risk a Chance, dam of this year’s Grade 2 winner Un Ojo.

Following the Bernardini colt, the two highest prices of the sale were by freshman sires, a $725,000 Girvin filly and a $675,000 Bolt d’Oro colt. Both stallions are Grade 1 winners and have already sired first-crop winners. Overall, eight of the top 16 prices came from freshmen.

The Girvin filly sold to bloodstock agent Donato Lanni, on behalf of Petersen. Her dam is a half-sister to Grade 2 winner Thousand Words.

The Bolt d’Oro colt was purchased by Spendthrift Farm, partnering with Frank Fletcher. The colt, among the large group tied for the second-fastest furlong of the breeze show at 10 seconds, is a half-brother to stakes winner The Grass Is Blue, from the family of champions Soaring Softly and Wavering Girl. Spendthrift stands Bolt d’Oro.