LEXINGTON, Ky. - Breeder Elizabeth Moran of Brushwood Stable paid $4 million to bring one of her own back home again at Monday's opening session of Keeneland's 10-day November breeding stock sale.

After a prolonged bidding duel with Sheikh Mohammed al Maktoum's agent, John Ferguson, Moran finally acquired the Alydar broodmare Twenty Eight Carat, the dam of Grade 1 winner A P Valentine. As if that were not alluring enough, the mare also is in foal to first-year sire and 2000 Kentucky Derby winner Fusaichi Pegasus, who stood this year for a $150,000 fee.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - When Coolmore likes a family, the global powerhouse wants to acquire all of the family it can find. And that, in essence, is how Coolmore came to own Johannesburg, winner of the Breeders' Cup Juvenile and now unbeaten in seven starts.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Our Dani, the dam of Grade 1 winner You, is likely to sell at Keeneland's January horses of all ages sale, according to a representative of the small Louisiana university that now owns her.

The University of Louisiana at Monroe received Our Dani, a Homebuilder mare, as a donation from breeder Dolphus Morrison, who sold You privately to Edmund Gann for $150,000. Now, Our Dani could be a godsend for the school's department of agriculture, which has been in financial difficulty.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Kentucky's November breeding stock sales, an important gauge of breeders' confidence in the industry's long-term prospects, will start under several clouds this year.

Mares and weanlings will come to market amid economic uncertainty, due to a slowing economy that was blown further off center by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and subsequent military strikes in Afghanistan.

Howard C. Nolan, the president of the New York Thoroughbred Breeders Inc., will conclude his second two-year term with the organization on Dec. 31.

Nolan, 69, said this week he will not seek a third term with the NYTB, whose board of directors will elect a new president early in 2002.

"I've enjoyed it, but I don't plan on another term," said Nolan, a New York state senator from 1975 to 1995. "It has been time-consuming."

The Virginia Thoroughbred Association's creative efforts to widen racing opportunities for Virginia-breds hit the mark last weekend.

On Sunday, Delaware Park played host to two $40,000 races for registered Virginia-bred 2-year-olds: the M. Tyson Gilpin Stakes and Hildene Stakes. Saturday evening, Charles Town served as the site for the second running of the $50,000 Blue and Grey Stakes, the second and final event in the 2001 Chenin Blanc Challenge pitting Virginia-breds against their West Virginia counterparts.

Harry and Louise Bono's Turning Point Farm is all of 10 acres. Art Appleton's Bridlewood Farm is is just under 1,000 acres. The broodmare population of Turning Point Farm is three. The broodmare count at Bridlewood Farm is in the hundreds.

In last week's Breeders' Cup World Thoroughbred Championship races, the Bridlewood Farm team was high on the chances of homebred Forbidden Apple in the Mile. He finished second. A half-hour later it was Team Turning Point Farm's time to root for its homebred Delaware Township in the Sprint. He ran sixth.

In 1999, when Rick Taylor left his high-powered position as general manager for John and Betty Mabee's successful Golden Eagle Farm in Ramona, Calif., he wasn't sure what aspect of the business to tackle next.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Grade 1-winning millionaire Aptitude, whose 10-length win in the 2001 Jockey Club Gold Cup earned the year's top Beyer Speed Figure of 123, has been retired to stud at Juddmonte Farms, the Lexington, Ky., nursery owned by the colt's owner and breeder, Khalid Abdullah. Aptitude, who finished eighth as the favorite in the Breeders' Cup Classic on Oct. 27, will stand for a $25,000 fee in 2002.

LAS VEGAS - Some observations from the Breeders' Cup:

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