A pair of broodmares raised the bar for the day and quickly raised it again during Thursday’s third session of the Keeneland November breeding stock sale, selling for more than $300,000 each.
The first horse to surpass the mark was Onza, a 3-year-old by Empire Maker, who sold to Lexington-based Dell Ridge Farm for $325,000.
Barbara Hunter, whose horses raced throughout North America under her familiar red-and-black silks for more than 50 years, died Wednesday night at her Brownwood farm home just south of Lexington, Ky. She was 78.
A native of Montana, Hunter became involved in the horse industry during the 1950s, after her adoptive mother, Mary H. Hunter, purchased Brownwood Farm. As a breeder, Hunter focused on developing productive female families, selling colts produced at the farm and keeping many of the fillies to race and eventually add them to her broodmare band.
It has been estimated that up to 75 percent of racehorses bleed in some manner during competition – yet approximately 95 percent of all U.S. horses perform on the diuretic Salix. The math here clearly doesn’t add up, perhaps belying the oft-defended notion that Salix, also known as Lasix, is a “humane” treatment required to “normalize” performance. Opponents of race-day medication suggest Salix is more of a performance enhancer, used by trainers largely to keep up with their peers.
The Breeders’ Cup results showcased the progeny of many of the international bloodstock market’s most prominent sires on the sport’s biggest stage, and Juddmonte Farms’s Mizzen Mast had a breakout weekend, siring two Breeders’ Cup winners, the only stallion to achieve such a feat this year.
On Nov. 2, French invader Flotilla posted her first career stakes win when she stormed home to take the Juvenile Fillies. The following day, it was West Coast-based Mizdirection who finished best of all to take the Turf Sprint.
Historians often refer to the early 20th century as the “Progressive Era,” a rather bland moniker considering the chaotic turbulence and high drama accompanying that period. In fact, those years represented a fast-paced, hair-raising time of war, revolution, and global pandemics, of political assassins and spies, extreme weather, monster earthquakes, rampaging social unrest, radical reform, brilliant innovation, horseless carriages, flying machines, and pictures that moved.
From the death of Mr. Prospector in 1999 until his own retirement from stud in 2008, Storm Cat was the most important commercial sire in the world. The primary reason for that commercial popularity was that he was perceived as the next great sire of sires, making his sons extremely valuable commodities at yearling sales.
Ro Parra’s Millennium Farms announced 2013 stud fees for its stallion roster on Wednesday, headlined by Even the Score, whose success with multiple Grade 1 winner Dullahan this year resulted in a stud fee increase from $10,000 in 2012 to $12,500.
Shackleford available for viewing at Darby Dan
By DRF Staff
Darby Dan farm announced that classic winner Shackleford will be available for viewing at the Lexington, Ky., farm from Friday through Sunday between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. each day. The 4-year-old Forestry colt has not yet been retired from racing, although plans remain for him to stand at Darby Dan in 2013.
Darby Dan is in the process of booking mares to the 2011 Preakness Stakes and 2012 Metropolitan Handicap winner for the upcoming season, and the farm wants him to be available for inspection by breeders.
Flower Alley, sire of dual classic winner I’ll Have Another, will stand for $20,000 this coming breeding season at Three Chimneys Farm, a big boost from the $7,500 fee he had at the start of the 2012 season.
The 10-year-old, Grade 1-winning son of Distorted Humor received national attention this spring when his son I’ll Have Another captured the Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes. Flower Alley began his stud career in 2007 at Robert Clay’s farm in Midway, Ky., and has sired eight stakes winners, five graded.
