An active weekend of prep races for the Kentucky Derby and Oaks left the late Scat Daddy at the top of the Beyer Sire Performance Standings by 3-year-old Beyer Speed Figures at the 90-plus and 100-plus levels in 2018.
The fall of the hammer on a seven-figure auction purchase is usually where the breeder's part in a horse's story ends, but Barbara Banke's Stonestreet Stables doesn't always play by that narrative.
Betting on the Kentucky Derby could turn out to be very interesting. The undefeated Justify very likely made himself the favorite with his dazzling victory over Bolt d’Oro in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Derby, but there are perhaps a half-dozen colts who could legitimately start at single-digit odds.
Hawkbill posted a major payday last weekend, winning the Group 1, $6 million Dubai Sheema Classic at Meydan. Half-brother Free Drop Billy looks for another major score for the family – and to punch his ticket to the Kentucky Derby – in Saturday's Grade 2, $1 million Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland.
Regardless of what it says on the tote board, Mr. Ping and Mr. Pong will have already defied astronomical odds when they break from the gate in Friday's fourth race at Charles Town.
The late racemare It's Tricky had an affinity for Aqueduct, winning all five of her starts there, including three stakes. Her son Enticed, her lone starter to date from three foals produced prior to her death last year, seems to have inherited the same. The Medaglia d'Oro colt won the Gotham Stakes in his most recent outing and now moves on to the Wood Memorial.
Since American breeders turned away from foreign-raced turf sires in the early 1990s after the contraction of the industry caused by the recession of the late 1980s, it has become routine to refer to some pedigrees as “dirt pedigrees” and others as “turf pedigrees.” As a veteran of the era when those same European turf stars routinely sired American dirt champions, I have never been very comfortable with such blithe dichotomies.
Mind Your Biscuits' victory in Saturday's Group 1 Dubai Golden Shaheen will be remembered for his heart-stopping stretch drive, but will also be noted as the race that made him the highest-earning New York-bred of all time.
Born Gold, the dam of champion Goldikova and five other group stakes winners, has died at age 27.
Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf winner Mendelssohn topped the 2016 Keeneland September yearling sale at $3 million, attracting hot interest as a half-brother to Grade 1 winners Beholder and Into Mischief from one of the final crops by internationally prominent sire Scat Daddy.
