POMONA, Calif. - The one-day Barretts selected 2-year-old sale, which last year appeared to be on the ropes, rebounded with a record-setting top price of $1.9 million for a Stormy Atlantic filly and financial gains across the board.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Alywow, the 1994 Canadian Horse of the Year and a valuable broodmare, was euthanized March 1 in Ireland at the age of 11 because of a bone infection, according to a report in the Racing Post.

A daughter of Alysheba, Alywow won the first race run over Woodbine's E.P. Taylor turf course, the 1994 Canadian Breeders' Cup Handicap. Her other stakes victories included the Grade 3 Nijana Stakes, the Canadian Maturity, and the Natalma. She won seven of 19 starts for earnings of $648,431.

POMONA, Calif. - The one-day Barretts selected 2-year-old sale, which last year appeared to be on the ropes, rebounded with a record-setting top price of $1.9 million for a Stormy Atlantic filly, and financial gains across the board.

Seattle Slew is recovering from surgery on Saturday to fuse the joint between two vertebrae that had been affected by arthritic changes.

The surgery, the second of its kind for Seattle Slew, took place at the Rood and Riddle Equine Hospital in Lexington, Ky. Seattle Slew, the 1977 Triple Crown winner who is now 28, underwent the same procedure in April 2000, after arthritic changes in a different area pressed on the horse's spinal cord, causing him to lose coordination.

Dr. Barrie Grant, who headed the surgical team in 2000, handled the procedure again.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - The Fasig-Tipton Calder sale on Feb. 26 featured two horses from a new 2-year-old seller: the Hancock family's famed Claiborne Farm in Paris, Ky.

Claiborne owner Seth Hancock has been outspoken in his opposition to the blazing eighth- and quarter-mile workouts that have become common at juvenile sales, which he believes put unnecessary pressure on the horses. So when Claiborne brought its two horses here to sell through Kip Elser's Kirkwood agency, Claiborne announced that neither would breeze. Both horses galloped at the under-tack shows.

ARCADIA, Calif. - The influence of California-breds on the Barretts March sale of selected 2-year-olds in-training has grown in recent years beyond the big-ticket buys by trainer Bob Baffert and his leading client, The Thoroughbred Corp.

As California-breds have become more prominent on a national scale - two of them, Gourmet Girl and Tiznow, earned Eclipse Awards for their 2001 campaigns - the state has produced juveniles capable of earning a berth in the important Barretts sale, held annually since 1990.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Two of the last four California-bred winners of the Santa Anita Handicap were bred by John and Betty Mabee's Golden Eagle Farm. This pair, Best Pal and General Challenge, were top-class racehorses. Breeding two such horses is no small achievement, but then Golden Eagle is no half-hearted operation, and the Mabees have the Eclipse Awards as leading American breeders to prove it.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - After the 2001 Barretts March selected 2-year-old sale in Pomona, Calif., which reported a 45 percent buy-back rate, many wondered if the auction would survive until 2002.

But the sale, to be held on March 5 this year, got a boost during the 2001 racing season. Several graduates won stakes last year, including 2001 champion sprinter Squirtle Squirt; Grade 1 winners Officer, Habibti, and Came Home; and graded stakes winners Kalookan Queen, Queenie Belle, and Skip to the Stone.

The Feb. 23 fire that burned down a training barn at Ocala Stud and took the lives of 22 horses is likely the result of an electrical malfunction.

"There's no other feasible explanation," said farm spokesman Karl Koontz.

Suffering the most damage from the fire was Carl Lizza who lost 14 of the 22 horses who died. Lizza's grief was quoted in local media.

"It's catastrophic," he said. "There is no word for it if you love horses.

Say Florida Sandy didn't care much for life on the farm and is back in trainer Juan Serey's barn at Aqueduct earlier than expected.

Say Florida Sandy, the all-time leading New York-bred in money won, was scheduled to take a three-month vacation at Janet Laszlo's Hunters Run Farm in Neptune, N.J, before returning to the track on April 1. Eight-year-old Say Florida Sandy, however, was itching to go home and arrived in Serey's barn last week.