LAS VEGAS - As the calendar turns to December, it is only natural to look ahead to next year's Triple Crown, and there are many 2-year-olds who have the talent - and pedigree - to prosper at age 3. Here are the current prime candidates:
Stevie Wonderboy
Following a foal auction that produced a sale-record gross, England's Tattersalls sale company launched its December mare auction Monday with early gains.
The opening-day topper was Ruby Rocket, who brought approximately $617,610, or 340,000 guineas in the local currency. BBA (Ireland) purchased the filly from Summerdown Stables. Ruby Rocket is a 4-year-old filly by Indian Rocket who has earned almost $100,000, won a pair of stakes, and been placed in Group 3 company twice. She is out of the placed Fairy King mare Geht Schnell.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - The Kentucky Horse Racing Authority gathered unanimous approval for its compromise plan to distribute funding for the Kentucky-bred breeders' incentive program, and considering the fact of unanimity itself, the group created a political success of significance.
Grade 1 winner Millennium Wind will stand the 2006 breeding season at Dr. Lynwood and Suzie O'Cain's Highcliff Farm in Delanson, N.Y. He moves to Highcliff Farm from Ro Parra's Millennium Farms in Kentucky.
The fee for the son of Cryptoclearance, whose first foals are 2-year-olds of 2006, is $5,000, live foal.
Millennium Wind originally was purchased for $1.2 million by Dave and Jill Heerensperger from Parrish Hill Farm, Lane's End agent, at the 1999 Keeneland September yearling sale.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - Ministers Wild Cat, a two-time stakes winner, was scheduled to arrive this weekend at Tommy Town Thoroughbreds in Santa Ynez, where he will stand at stud in 2006.
Ministers Wild Cat finished last of 14 in the Grade 1 De Francis Dash at Laurel last weekend, the final start of his career.
Ministers Wild Cat, 5, won 6 of 22 starts and $368,729, winning the 2003 Golden State Mile at Golden Gate Fields and the 2005 Jacques Cartier Stakes at Woodbine. He was trained in his career by Neil Drysdale and Mark Casse.
The annual Florida Farm Managers Inc.'s Parade of Stallions and Equine Trade Show takes place this Sunday, beginning at 10 a.m., at the Ocala Equestrian Complex, which is located adjacent to the north end of the Ocala Breeders' Sales Company. Thirty-one stallions are on the program, although that number is subject to change, according to the farm managers' executive director, Debbe Wojack
"We try to accommodate everyone who wants to show their stallions at this exhibition," she said. "We'll take entries right up to the last second."
The legendary Windfields Farm has a much different role in racing and breeding in the 21st century than it did decades ago, but E.P. Taylor's prized Thoroughbred bloodlines still run strong.
Adorned, who represents seven generations of Windfields breeding, tracing back to Taylor's 1932 mare Nandi, is the morning-line favorite to be named the outstanding broodmare at the 31st Sovereign Awards on Dec. 16.
The broodmare award is presented to a mare who has had a Canadian-bred stakes winner in the current year as well as a previous year.
High Fly, winner of this year's Florida Derby, has been retired because of a condylar fracture, said Charlotte Weber of Live Oak Plantation, High Fly's owner.
A 3-year-old Atticus colt, is at Live Oak, Weber said, awaiting plans to be confirmed for his stud career.
"He had surgery in New Jersey, and he's doing fine," Weber said Thursday. "While I'm sure he'd come back sound, I'm not sure he'd come back to run at the Grade 1 level again."
Pleasant Home, winner of this year's Breeders' Cup Distaff, has been retired from racing and will be bred in 2006 to Awesome Again, Claiborne Farm staff said Wednesday.
A 4-year-old Seeking the Gold filly, Pleasant Home raced for her breeder, Ogden Mills Phipps, who bred her from the Pleasant Colony mare Our Country Place. Pleasant Home won 5 of her 12 starts in 2004 and 2005.
