An ultrasound examination taken Wednesday shows Zenyatta appears to be holding her first pregnancy, owner Jerry Moss said.

Moss confirmed that the planned ultrasound exam, the second one since the 7-year-old Horse of the Year’s Feb. 23 mating to Bernardini, took place Wednesday. Moss called the scan “a successful procedure” and confirmed the mare still is in foal. The routine ultrasound was carried out 28 days post-breeding and followed an initial ultrasound on March 10 that first confirmed Zenyatta’s pregnancy.

Clear Creek Stud in Louisiana has pensioned Grade 1-winning sire Afternoon Deelites to the Old Friends equine retirement facility in Georgetown, Ky.

The 19-year-old Afternoon Deelites, a son of Private Terms, has stood at Clear Creek, near Folsom, La., since 2004.

Average sales price showed a slight increase over last year at the John Franks Memorial 2-year-olds in training sale held last Sunday at Evangeline Downs. A total of 134 horses were catalogued and 113 sold for a collective $901,500 and an average of $7,978, a 2.2 percent increase from 2010. Gross receipts declined 14 percent from the 2010 mark of $1,045,700.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Pre-sale optimism proved justified Monday night when the Barretts March select 2-year-old sale performed well above last year’s level, posting double-digit gains in average and median at its first-ever nighttime session.

Thirteen juveniles clocked in 10-second works over an eighth-mile Friday at the Barretts March select 2-year-old auction's under-tack show.

That was the fastest time at the distance. The under-tack preview took place at Fairplex Park in Pomona, Calif., where the one-day auction also will take place Monday in the Hinds Pavilion.
Two of those fast one-furlong workers were by Wildcat Heir: Hip No. 8, a colt out of Conqueress from the family of Richman, and Hip No. 28, a Wildcat Heir-Hasty Appeal colt who is a half-brother to Kelly Leak and Dr. Park.

The result of more than five months of hopes and expectations will be known for pinhooker Bruno de Berdt at the Barretts March sale of 2-year-olds in Pomona, Calif., on Monday.

Last fall, at the Barretts California Cup yearling sale, de Berdt paid $42,000 for a Bertrando colt, who was among the 10 most expensive horses purchased at that sale. The colt is back in the sale ring again on Monday, as Hip No. 75 in a one-day select sale that begins at 7 p.m. and has a catalog of 104 2-year-olds.

The Barretts auction house in Pomona, Calif., will host its March select 2-year-old sale on Monday, presenting the single-session sale at night for the first time.

A dramatic format change that combined the Ocala Breeders’ Sales Company’s February and March select juvenile auctions resulted in a higher total gross for the auction house, but consignors warn that the 2-year-old market is still highly selective.

The two-day OBS March select sale ended late Wednesday afternoon with $25,563,000 in gross receipts from 244 horses sold, up 44 percent from last year’s March select gross for 167 horses and 6 percent higher than last year’s combined February and March sale gross, $24,180,000.

Cathy Roby, the Kentucky Horse Park’s longtime Hall of Champions manager, died Wednesday night in St. Joseph Hospital in Lexington, Ky. She was 62.

Roby had entered the hospital after suffering what the Kentucky Horse Park described on its Facebook page as “a massive stroke” on March 14. Roby was best known as the late Hall of Famer John Henry’s closest companion after his retirement to the park in 1985. Roby cared for the gelding for the last 16 years of his life, until his death at 32 in October 2007.

Kaleem Shah gave the Ocala Breeders’ Sales Company’s select 2-year-old market a lift Wednesday morning, bidding $925,0000 for a Flatter colt. The colt, Hip No. 265, had the under-tack show’s co-fastest quarter-mile time, 20.6 seconds, last week.

Hall of Fame trainer Bob Baffert signed the ticket for Shah.

The price was the two-day auction’s highest and came on a day of moderate declines in median and a small decline in average.