The figures for gross receipts and average for New York-breds at the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga selected yearling sale declined substantially when compared with results for the same sale in 2005.
The 86th annual edition of the sale was conducted Aug. 8-9 at the Humphrey S. Finney Pavilion in Saratoga Springs, N.Y.
Eleven registered New York-breds grossed $2,270,000, for an average of $206,364, for respective declines of 31 percent and 37.5 percent. At the 2005 sale, 10 statebreds grossed $3.3 million, for an average of $330,000.
Minshall Farms, the top-class racing and breeding operation founded by the late Aubrey Minshall in Ontario more than 30 years ago, will have a much different look in years to come.
While the popular brown and tan silks will still be seen at Woodbine, the players have changed, as Minshall's sons Shawn and Patrick have dissolved their partnership.
"Minshall Farms as we know it is no longer," said Barbara Minshall, Aubrey's widow, who has trained the horses for the family since 1995. Shawn and Patrick Minshall are from a previous marriage of Aubrey Minshall's.
Two Sophisticated proved she fit right in with the Saratoga crowd when she appeared in the sales ring on opening night of Fasig-Tipton's sale of selected yearlings. A flashy chestnut Two Punch filly, she was sold to Jess Jackson's Stonestreet Stable LLC for $360,000, the top price among the eight Maryland-breds offered at this year's sale, held on Aug. 8-9 at the Humphrey S. Finney Pavilion.
Satish and Anne Sanan's Padua Stables is scarcely 9 years old, but its mark on Florida breeding is already indelible. This past week the Padua sire Exchange Rate, a Grade 2 stakes-winning son of Danzig, was well represented on both coasts. At Saratoga, Swap Fliparoo won the Grade 1 Test Stakes to become the first graded stakes winner for Exchange Rate, and hours later Exchange Rate's 2-year-old filly Outofthepast finished second in the Grade 2 Sorrento Stakes at Del Mar.
Organizers are predicting higher average prices at Tuesday's third annual northern California yearling sale in Pleasanton.
The 2005 sale showed modest growth compared to the inaugural sale in 2004, with 164 yearlings selling for an average of $7,582, a gain of 10 percent. The sale had a record gross of $1,243,500 last year. The sale topper was a Bertrando colt who sold for $50,000, and six yearlings sold for $30,000 or more.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - The battle of Saratoga - the Saratoga sale, that is - pitted a newcomer against a longtime player. And this time, relatively new buyer Ahmed Zayat outbid market stalwart Sheikh Mohammed al-Maktoum and took home the top-priced lot, a $1.6 million Empire Maker-Sluice filly.
Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro's surgeon saw encouraging signs Tuesday that the colt's hind legs are healing, according to an update issued Wednesday by the veterinary hospital where Barbaro is being treated for fractures in his right hind leg and laminitis in his left hind.
Dr. Dean Richardson, chief of surgery at the University of Pennsylvania's New Bolton Center equine hospital, changed the cast on Barbaro's right hind leg late Tuesday afternoon with the colt under general anesthesia.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - Debby Oxley was sitting in her usual seat on Tuesday night at the opening of Fasig-Tipton's Saratoga select yearling sale. But she was wearing a different hat, figuratively speaking.
Oxley and her husband, John, who raced 2001 Kentucky Derby winner Monarchos and such outstanding fillies as 1999 champion mare Beautiful Pleasure, often move the market as buyers in the $300,000 to $1 million range. But on Tuesday night, Debby Oxley wasn't buying a high-class filly, she was selling one. And it was, frankly, a little anxiety-inducing.
