Fasig-Tipton Midlantic: Mixed sale a regional draw

On the heels of a largely positive November auction season in Central Kentucky, the Fasig-Tipton Midlantic December mixed sale will look to continue that successful run as the weeks dwindle down in 2014.

The one-day sale will be held Monday at Fasig-Tipton’s Midlantic base at the Maryland State Fairgrounds in Timonium, Md., beginning at 11 a.m. Eastern.

This year’s renewal features a catalog of 202 broodmares, weanlings, and horses of racing age, which marks a 6 percent decrease from last year’s catalog of 214 offerings. Sixteen horses were listed as withdrawn from the sale as of Dec. 2.

Fasig-Tipton Midlantic auctions typically draw from a melting pot of regional programs, and this year’s edition of the December mixed sale is no different. The sale’s weanlings hail from Florida, Kentucky, Maryland, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia, while foals out of the mares pregnant to the region’s stallions will qualify for a litany of incentive programs.

“The recently announced positive changes to purses and awards in Maryland have definitely reset the focus on Maryland-breds,” said Fasig-Tipton Midlantic sales director Paget Bennett.

“More than half of our weanlings are eligible for these programs, and we also have significant numbers from Pennsylvania and other neighboring states with strong statebred incentives. The sire power among this group is diverse and pretty impressive.”

The December mixed sale will be one of the first opportunities for buyers to view and purchase weanlings from the first crops of several national and regional stallions. Among the sires whose first foals are cataloged are Astrology, Brilliant Speed, Cal Nation, Dialed In, Dominus, Gattopardo, Hansen, Mission Impazible, Nicanor, Rule, Shackleford, and Soaring Empire.

Sires with mares in foal from their first seasons at stud include Despite the Odds, El Padrino, Freedom Child, and Hunters Bay.

Last year’s renewal of the Midlantic December mixed sale posted significant gains, with 133 horses sold for revenues of $1,516,700. That figure marked a 32 percent improvement compared to the gross in 2012.

The average sale price in 2013 rose 39 percent to $11,404, while the $5,000 median increased 25 percent. The 2013 buyback rate held steady at 28 percent.

Topping last year’s sale was Mystic Love, a Maryland-bred, stakes-winning 3-year-old Not For Love filly who sold to Greenmount Farm for $100,000. Consigned by Bill Reightler, as agent, Mystic Love was the only offering of the sale to sell for six figures. Mystic Love is unplaced in five starts this year.

The highest-priced weanling of last year’s auction was a Kitten’s Joy colt out of the winning E Dubai mare Right On It, who sold to Highclere Inc. for $92,000. The colt, whose full sister, Right On Kitten, became a stakes winner in 2014, was bred in New York and consigned by McMahon of Saratoga Thoroughbreds, agent. Highclere pinhooked the colt at last summer’s Fasig-Tipton New York-bred preferred yearling sale, where he purchased by bloodstock agents Nick Sallusto and Hanzly Albina for $140,000.