LEXINGTON, Ky. - After a season of decline in the yearling market, stallion owners could be next in line to feel the pinch as breeders push for lower stud fees. But some stud owners warn that lower stud fees are only a Band-Aid for hard times, and that higher purses and a stronger racing product are the real key to breeders' long-term profitability.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - The victories by Seattle Smooth in the Cotillion and My Pal Charlie in the Super Derby are examples of the major role played by small-scale breeders in the Thoroughbred business.
Their breeding decisions are sometimes shaped as much by practical factors, like cost and location of bloodstock, as by notions of pedigree, but breeders with small operations are the underpinning of the entire Thoroughbred business.
Youngsters by New York sires Performing Magic and Hook and Ladder won a pair of important stakes last Sunday at Belmont Park.
Performing Magic's son Trinity Magic won the Bertram F. Bongard, while Hook and Ladder's daughter Sneakin Up took the Joseph A. Gimma. Both $100,000 events were at seven furlongs on the main track.
The yearling market trend, since the Fasig-Tipton auction of mid July, has been somewhat bearish. The recently concluded Keeneland yearling sales confirmed a weak market. But, is this a short- or long-term trend?
As one wag put it: In times of uncertainty when the option is to sell the boat or forgo horse buying, wives usually opt to keep the boat.
Prices continued to fall Saturday as the two-week Keeneland September yearling sale wound down to its Sept. 23 conclusion. After posting 20- to 25-percent drops at its Friday session, the Saturday session had a $70,000 session-leader in Hip No. 4285, a Closing Argument filly.
John Brocklebank, a yearling-to-juvenile reseller who has been highly active in the auction's second week, purchased the daughter of the winning Arch mare Arch Enemy. Claiborne, agent, was the seller.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - The business of buying and selling Thoroughbreds continued as usual Friday at Keeneland's September yearling sale, and on Day 11 the theme was much the same as at earlier sessions: Yearlings perceived to be the day's best offerings brought six figures, but there was less competition for less obvious choices.
At 5 p.m., Friday's session-topper at $195,000 was Hip No. 3803, a Bernstein colt out of Sparkler that Gulf Coast Farm, a yearling-to-juvenile pinhooking partnership, bought from Buck Pond Farm, agent.
POMONA, Calif. - A few years ago, the chaos of running a stallion farm finally got to breeders Matt and Barbara Butterworth. There had to be a more enjoyable end to Thoroughbred breeding, they thought.
"Standing a stallion is a lot of work," Barbara Butterworth said earlier this week. "It's hard to get good help at the farm. The stallion is only as good as the management at the farm. It's stressful. It's a go, go, go time during the breeding season. We decided we needed to change our direction."
LEXINGTON, Ky. - Jess Jackson, majority owner of the 2007 Horse of the Year, Curlin, wants that chestnut son of Smart Strike to accomplish something that has not been done before. Despite a game exercise against previous Breeders' Cup Turf winners Red Rocks (2006) and Better Talk Now (2004) in the Man o' War Stakes, Curlin ran second and will not tackle the Breeders' Cup Classic-Arc de Triomphe double.
But how about something that has not been accomplished in 29 years?
Through 10 days of the giant Keeneland September yearling sale, Canadian horsepeople have been busy buying and selling.
But it is the folks from western Canada, not Ontario, who have been making the most noise from standpoint of bidding through the first 3,700 yearlings sold.
Leading the group are Jim and Susan Hill of Calgary, Alberta, who bought half a dozen yearlings for $855,000 through the first eight sessions.
Stallions with South American connections generally have a tough time making it in the Northern Hemisphere. The last stallion to plant his roots in Florida and do well commercially was the Venezuelan sire Petare.
He stood at Joe LaCroix's Meadowbrook Farm in the 1960s. The late Fred W. Hooper, along with Arnie Winick (Del Ray Training Center), also attempted to catch some hybrid vigor through their South American stallion imports, but each met with limited success at best.