2011 stallion leaders
• Leading sires
• Leading turf sires
• Leading 2-year-old sires
• Leading first-crop sires
• Leading sires
• Leading turf sires
• Leading 2-year-old sires
• Leading first-crop sires
LEXINGTON, Ky. − Duncan Taylor owns Taylor Made Farm in Kentucky, but these days he’s keeping a close eye on New York. Taylor Made − one of the world’s leading Thoroughbred breeding and sales operations − is considering expanding into the Empire State, Taylor said, now that Aqueduct’s casino dramatically has ramped up horses’ and breeders’ earning power.
As new money from the Aqueduct casino gets pumped into the New York-bred program, the state’s stallion colony continues to be significantly overhauled. Old standards such as Freud, Catienus, and Roaring Fever have been joined by proven Kentucky stallions such as Posse, Congaree, Touch Gold, and Bluegrass Cat. This year sees the addition of some quality first-season horses, such as Grade 1 winners Girolamo, Dublin, and Here Comes Ben.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Keeneland has cataloged 161 juveniles to its select 2-year-old auction, which takes place on April 9.
The 2012 April sale will start at 4 p.m. at Keeneland’s sale pavilion. An under-tack preview for the auction is set for April 5, starting at 10:30 a.m.
The 2012 catalog number is nearly level with last year’s catalog of 169 horses. Catalogs will be available online at www.keeneland.com starting March 6, and print editions will be mailed the week of March 19.
LEXINGTON, Ky. − For racing fans, the 2012 foaling season is particularly special. For the first time, two female Horses of the Year will produce their first foals. One already has − Rachel Alexandra, the 2009 Horse of the Year, foaled her Curlin colt at Stonestreet Farms in Kentucky on Jan. 22. Now the world awaits a second “royal” birth, that of Zenyatta’s Bernardini foal at Lane’s End Farm, also in Kentucky.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - Frank Justice, the owner of Dell Ridge Farm with his wife Mattie, died here Saturday at age 79. No cause of death was given.
Justice bred such stakes performers as multiple Grade 1 winner Shakespeare, whom he campaigned in partnership with William Schettine. Other Dell Ridge-bred stakes-winners include Morning Line, Kid Kate, La Verita, and Tiger’s Rock. He also raced, in partnership, the two-time graded winners Della Francesca and Wiseman’s Ferry.
The Barretts sale company and Del Mar racetrack will conduct a horses of racing age sale at the San Diego County racetrack on July 22, Barretts general manager Kim Lloyd said over the weekend.
Details of the Paddock Sale at Del Mar have yet to be finalized, Lloyd said. The event will be held after the final race on a Sunday evening and will feature 30 to 40 horses. The July 22 program is the first Sunday of the Del Mar meeting, which runs from July 18 through Sept. 5.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Holladay Road, a former claimer, has had an adventuresome journey to the $750,000 Santa Anita Handicap next Saturday.
A California-bred, Holladay Road became a stakes winner earlier at this meeting, in the $100,000 Crystal Water Stakes for statebreds on Jan. 28. But the 7-year-old Holladay Road will need to show considerable improvement to be a factor in the Big Cap, and to keep up with several of his more accomplished siblings.