OBS kicks off 2-year-old in training sales season

On your mark, get set, go. The North American breeze-up sale season gets under way this week, with the Ocala Breeders’ Sales Co.’s March sale of 2-year-olds in training taking place over three sessions, from Tuesday through Thursday.

This is the first of three sales that OBS will host this season on a major-market calendar virtually unchanged from the 2023 layout. Between its March sale – which has 853 hips cataloged – and its April and June auctions, OBS will handle the bulk of the offerings from this crop.

This OBS March sale is coming off a strong renewal in 2023. The sale expanded to three sessions from two in 2022, and understandably, gross sales spiked to $71,110,500 from 460 horses sold, compared to $49,371,633 from 374 sold. With five seven-figure lots topping the action, the average price was $154,588, up 17 percent from $132,008 in 2022, while the median was unchanged at $75,000. The buyback rate was 21 percent in what has developed as a selective marketplace; it was 12 percent in 2022. Recently, numbers under 20 percent are considered outstanding.

In addition to a strong 2023 2-year-old season, market momentum for this season has been established by strong demand for young stock in the yearling and mixed-sale seasons.

“We expect the 2-year-old market to look very similar to the market we saw in 2023,” said Carlos Manresa, director of operations for consignor Sequel. “The recent Fasig-Tipton digital sales as well as the Kentucky winter mixed sale were very encouraging. The Lothenbach dispersal obviously garnered a lot of support, but the buying was widespread and benefited other consignments as well. As both buyers and sellers of yearlings, we found the yearling sales polarizing and competitive at the top end as they have been for the last few years. However, as pinhookers, we felt like we were able to get a lot of value when the opportunities presented themselves.”

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The 2023 OBS March topper at $2 million was Muth, who went on to win the Grade 1 American Pharoah and finish second in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile to be voted an Eclipse Award finalist. The colt was among those tied for the fastest furlong time – at 9 3/5 seconds – during the under-tack preview show for the sale, a prime illustration of the correlation between breeze times and prices. Analysis of times and prices show that juveniles working a furlong in less than 10 seconds were the highest-priced group at this sale last year, averaging $395,195, compared to $224,935 for those working in 10 seconds flat. Those who worked a quarter-mile in less than 21 seconds averaged $361,000.

The OBS March breeze show was taking place over four sessions, from March 6-9, on the Ocala Training Center’s all-weather Safetrack surface. Horses have emerged from the Ocala sales to compete well on dirt and turf as well.

“I love the consistency in the track,” bloodstock agent Liz Crow told OBS publicity. “If you’ve been here over and over and over again, you really get a feel for how the horses move across it, and that translates a lot, I think, to all different surfaces.”

These precocious 2-year-olds have come out ready to take their marks for this sale. As of 11 a.m. Friday – several hours into the penultimate session of the breeze show, with more than half of the catalog having worked – 37 juveniles had breezed their furlong in less than 10 seconds, the gold standard.

First-crop sires have been well advertised with progeny who have lit up stopwatches during this breeze show, led by 2020 Belmont and Travers stakes winner Tiz the Law and fellow multiple Grade 1 winner Vekoma, who had offspring tied for the fastest furlong thus far, at 9 3/5 seconds. In addition to his bullet-sharing colt, Tiz the Law also had a filly in the logjam of 35 juveniles tied for the next-fastest time as of Friday morning, at 9 4/5 seconds.

Sharing the fastest quarter-mile time as of Friday morning, at 20 2/5 seconds, were a filly by consistent sire Munnings and a filly by Triple Crown winner Justify. Juveniles by Justify should be in strong demand this season, now that he has shown consistent prowess with this division. The stallion was a close third on the 2022 freshman sire list, then led the overall 2-year-old sire list by a wide margin last year, topped by Eclipse Award champion juvenile filly Just F Y I.

In addition to new and emerging sires, interest also is added to this OBS March catalog with the final phase of the dispersal for the late Robert Lothenbach. Following an online dispersal of racing stock that saw strong returns and breeding stock offerings that pushed Fasig-Tipton February to record returns, 41 2-year-olds from the stable are on offer this week.

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