For Maryland's newest stallion prospect, Rush Bay, the journey from the racetrack to the breeding shed has been "nothing short of miraculous," says Mark Basinger, manager of his family's Mueller Thoroughbred Stables, which bred and owns the 6-year-old stallion.

Rush Bay, a big, handsome bay son of turf champion Cozzene, will soon take up residence at Allen and Audrey Murray's Murmur Farm in Darlington, Md., where he will stand his first full season at stud in 2009 for $3,500 live foal. Just one year ago, that prospect seemed remote.

It was the middle market that provided the strength for last year's selected session of the Canadian-bred yearling sale, held by the Ontario division of the Canadian Thoroughbred Horse Society.

This year, breeders and consignors are hoping for a big boost in buyer power to bolster the overall market and help the auction rebound from last year's dips in gross and average price.

While the median price last year jumped 18 percent from $27,000 to $32,000 for the selected session, the average price fell just under 7 percent, from $43,000 to $40,000.

The Ocala Breeders’ Sales Company’s selected sale of yearlings gets under way Monday morning. It will be followed by three days of open sessions. Starting time for all four days is 10:30 a.m. There are 230 yearlings cataloged for the OBS selected session, and 1,112 cataloged for the open session.

Student Council, a two-time Grade 1 winner, will retire from racing at the end of the year to enter stud at Millennium Farms, the Paris, Ky., farm announced Tuesday.

Millennium will announce Student Council’s fee later this year. A 6-year-old Kingmambo horse, Student Council is pointing for the Aug. 24 Pacific Classic at Del Mar.

According to the announcement, Millennium Farms intends to syndicate Student Council, and at least one shareholder already has made himself known: the horse’s breeder, Lane’s End owner Will Farish. Lane’s End stands Kingmambo.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Fasig-Tipton’s New York-bred preferred yearling auction ended Sunday night in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., with an improvement on its opening-night buy-back rate and a gain in overall average and median prices. But buy-backs also were up from last year's figure, rising from 41 percent to 47 percent for the two-night sale.

A $165,000 Chapel Royal colt led Sunday’s second session. James J. Barry was the buyer from Paramount Sales, agent. The colt is out of the El Gran Senor mare Devoted and is a half-brother to the stakes-placed filly Clarksburg Queen.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Fasig-Tipton’s New York-bred preferred yearling sale rang up increases in average price and median at its first session Saturday night in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., but the gains were marred by the fact that slightly more than half of the horses offered failed to reach their reserve prices.

Topped by a $500,000 Mr. Greeley filly, five New York-breds grossed $975,000 at the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga select yearling sale on Aug. 4-5.

Consigned as Hip No. 10 by Kaizen Sales, agent, she was purchased by Blandford Bloodstock Ltd. Named Princess Aurora, she is a half-sister to multiple stakes winner Willard Straight and to New York-bred stakes winner Jesse's Justice.

Until last weekend, Kosmo's Buddy was the best Maryland-bred filly of her generation not to win a stakes.

Appropriately, she graduated to the rank of stakes winners with a hard-fought, 1 1/4-length victory against nine rivals in Monmouth Park's Crank It Up Stakes for 3-year-old fillies.

It was a thrilling moment for longtime Maryland horseman Arnold Smolen, who bred Kosmo's Buddy and owns her with his 39-year-old son, Adam.

Fast Lane Farms, the breeding operation of horseman Steve Warner, has never been a big outfit.

"We've never had more than three or four mares," said Warner, whose principal business provides feed at Southern California Thoroughbred tracks.

Warner was the breeder of two starters at the 2006 Breeders' Cup at Churchill Downs - Thor's Echo, who won the Sprint, and Dancing Edie, who finished eighth in the Filly and Mare Turf.

The results of the recent yearling sales hosted by Fasig-Tipton, one conducted in mid-July in Lexington, Ky., and the other a two-day boutique auction Monday and Tuesday at Saratoga, confirms that there is still ample money in the market for eye-catching yearlings sporting upscale pedigrees. What has not been tested so far in ’08 is the middle market for yearlings. The first of these middle markets is coming on line in eight days.