LEXINGTON, Ky. - Eugene Melnyk, a major buyer at Thoroughbred auctions and the owner of such runners as Grade 1 winner Tweedside, is set to purchase Harry T. Mangurian, Jr.'s famed Mockingbird Farm in Ocala, Fla.

The deal for the 1,100-acre property is expected to close by mid-January and will give Melnyk and his wife, Laura, their first Thoroughbred nursery. Phil Hronec, currently farm manager for John Franks's Franks Farm Southland Division in Ocala, will take over on Jan. 15 as general manager and trainer for the Melnyks at Mockingbird.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Good and Tough, who stood in 2001 at Vinery in Lexington, will relocate to Lakland North in Hudson, N.Y., beginning in 2002. The 6-year-old Carson City horse will stand next year for $6,000, down from $8,500 this year.

A $576,931 Danehill colt topped Friday's Hong Kong Jockey Club's Piaget International sale and set a record as the auction's most expensive sale topper.

The one-night auction, conducted in Hong Kong by Keeneland, sold 38 juvenile colts and geldings without reserve for total revenue of $7,224,452 (American). The auction's average price, as would be expected from an increase in catalog size, dropped 31 percent in local currency and was $190,117 when converted to American currency.

The New York Racing Association has returned next year's New York Showcase Fall Festival to a one-day format. The biggest event of the year for New York-breds, the New York Showcase comprises seven stakes for statebreds, worth a total of $1 million.

Allen and Audrey Murray didn't shop around for a new stallion to stand at their Murmur Farm in Darlington, Md., in 2002. Somehow, they found two of next season's most exciting prospects without even looking.

New to Maryland are Our Emblem, the gorgeously bred former Claiborne Farm stallion who arrived at Murmur in mid-November, and Disco Rico, one of the most awe-inspiring competitors to race in Maryland in recent years, due to arrive at the farm next week.

OCALA, Fla. - Frank Stronach, the chairman of Magna Corporation, has contracted to buy more than 400 acres of real estate in Ocala horse country, and the question that no one seems willing to answer yet is: Why?

The real estate, which was contracted through Steve Gray, an Ocala attorney, is on the east side of Interstate 75, north of and partly in Ocala's city limits. Stronach owns Adena Springs South, a 3,200-acre Thoroughbred nursery and training facility north of Ocala, about 20 miles from the contracted site.

INGLEWOOD, Calif. - The $70,000 Corona Handicap on Sunday at Hollywood Park is worth a fraction of the prizes that Notable Career competed for last year. But the purse of the overnight handicap is an accurate barometer of how far Notable Career, a Grade 1 winner at 2, has slumped as a 3-year-old.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Loudrangle, Sam-Son Farms' Canadian broodmare of the year in 1986, died of old age at the farm in Ontario, Canada, during the night of Dec. 12, according to farm officials. She was 27.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Topped by the $50,000 broodmare Lovely Ghost, Fasig-Tipton Kentucky's fall mixed sale on Monday offered fewer horses and had financial declines across the board.

The one-day auction sold 121 lots, down substantially from the 197 it sold last year, and gross revenue this year fell 55 percent, to $531,400. The average price dropped 27 percent, from $6,002 last year to $4,392 in 2001. The median fell 14 percent, from $3,500 to $3,000 this year.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - L'Agence Francaise's winter mixed sale in Deauville, France, which featured a larger catalog this year, concluded Monday with declines in gross and average.

The 6-year-old broodmare Bayourida, sold in foal to European champion Anabaa, topped the sale when Chantilly Bloodstock purchased her for $230,786. The three-day auction sold 502 horses for total receipts of $7,576,660 and an average price of $15,093. Calculated in French francs, the sale's gross revenue was down slightly, by 1 percent, from last year.