Mill Ridge celebrates Chandler's induction, Oscar Performance's debut

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Mill Ridge Farm’s general manager Price Bell says the Fasig-Tipton sales in Saratoga are special because the boutique catalog and several days of showing allow more time to spotlight individual horses, and for buyers to spend time with a horse they’re interested in.

“People have a lot of time to look at horses, they have a lot of time to get excited about horses and to fall in love,” Bell said. “And we have a lot of time to share with people why we like the horses. Everyone has worked really hard to get to this stage. It’s three years from conception to today, and you’re proud of what you’re bringing to the place, and you want to be able to share with people why you believe in them.”

This horse-centric approach was one espoused by Bell’s grandmother the late Alice Headley Chandler, who died in April at age 95. Besides the return of the Fasig-Tipton sales following a year’s hiatus due to the pandemic, this has been a particularly special month in Saratoga for her family. Prior to bringing the Mill Ridge consignments to the August sales – including yearlings from the first crop of the farm’s home-raised stallion Oscar Performance – the family gathered in Saratoga to celebrate the induction of Chandler into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame as a Pillar of the Turf.

The category honors individuals “who have made extraordinary contributions to Thoroughbred racing in a leadership or pioneering capacity at the highest national level.”

Chandler’s sons have all followed her into the Thoroughbred industry, along with several other family members. At the presentation of her Hall of Fame plaque, one of her sons, bloodstock agent Reynolds Bell, spoke, while joined on the stage by Chandler’s husband, John Chandler, and sons Headley Bell and Mike Bell.

“Mom kept it pretty simple – take care of the horse, and the horse will take care of you,” Reynolds Bell said. “We heard that often growing up. Mom would be incredibly humbled by this award today, and would thank all the horses and people who made it possible.”

Among the people who made it possible are the longtime clients Mill Ridge prides itself on. Those clients include John and Jerry Amerman, for whom Oscar Performance was foaled and raised at Mill Ridge. Oscar Performance eventually returned home to begin his stallion career after a racing career that included seven graded stakes victories.

Oscar Performance’s career was highlighted by a quartet of Grade 1 victories – the 2016 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf, 2017 Belmont Derby and Secretariat Stakes, and 2018 Woodbine Mile. His three other graded stakes scores included a virtuoso performance in the Grade 3 Poker Stakes in June 2018 at Belmont Park when he sizzled a mile on turf in a course-record 1:31.23, tying the North American record for a mile on grass.

Oscar Performance was represented by his first yearlings at the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga selected sale on Aug. 9-10, with a filly sold to bloodstock agent Bo Bromagen for $180,000 and another filly sold to Madaket Stables for $80,000. The stallion also had a New York-bred colt sold at the statebred sale on Aug. 16, going to Begg Racing for $55,000.

:: DRF BREEDING LIVE: Real-time coverage of breeding and sales

“It was a good sale to showcase Oscar Performance because you could see them walk, you could spend time with them, you could think about them,” Price Bell said. “With a first-crop sire, you want people to think about them, you want people to be reminded. Oscar ran his last race in 2018. That was a long time ago – that was pre-pandemic! So we wanted a place where we could really showcase them to people so we could remind them about his career, his success.”

As this yearling sale season rolls along, Oscar Performance will be represented by 33 first-crop yearlings at the Keeneland September yearling sale, which kicks off Sept. 13. Chandler’s father, Hal Price Headley, was a co-founder and former president of Keeneland, and has now been joined by his daughter as a Pillar of the Turf.

Before going home to Keeneland, however, the Mill Ridge consignment sold seven horses in Saratoga between the two yearling sales, for a total gross of $1,965,000. Working the consignment were staff who have been with the farm since the early 1990s.

“For my grandmother to go into the Hall of Fame, and then to have a really good sale, and to still have the same people . . .” Price Bell marveled. “We’re only as good as our people – our people and our horses. That’s how it’s always been – long may it last.”