LEXINGTON, Ky. - Surely the quality of this year's running of the Spinaway, Saratoga's most important stakes for juvenile fillies, will cause the personnel on the Graded Stakes Committee to rethink their planning just a bit. The winner and runner-up in the race were Adieu and Folklore, who figure to be the favorite and second-favorite for the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Buyers looking for mares or weanlings will have an unusual auction to add to the calendar on Sunday. Doug Arnold's Buck Pond Farm in Versailles, Ky., will host a small sale that will have the dual purpose of showing off improvements to Buck Pond's facilities and promoting the historic farm's stallion roster. The afternoon will also feature a stallion show.

Dan Hendricks has already heard the criticism of the Grade 2 Norfolk Stakes at Santa Anita on Oct. 2, a race he won with Brother Derek.

The race was too slow and the field was sub-par. Such comments just bring a smile to Hendricks.

"They knocked the Santa Anita Derby didn't they?" Hendricks asked a few days ago.

Yes, the quality of the Santa Anita Derby back in April was criticized in the build-up to the Kentucky Derby. Then, Giacomo, who was fourth in the Santa Anita Derby, pulled a shocking win in the Kentucky Derby.

Once again a Korean contingent attending an Ocala Breeders' Sales Company auction made its presence felt. This time around the Koreans, 24 of them in all, bought 61 lots for $987,800 at the recent OBS fall mixed sale. Since patronizing the Ocala sales for the first time five years ago, buyers from Korea have purchased 370 horses - weanlings, yearlings, 2-year-olds in training, and broodmares - for a gross of approximately $4.7 million.

Sixty-two New York-breds are cataloged in the Fasig-Tipton Kentucky fall yearling sale, to be held Monday through Wednesday in Lexington, Ky.

Selling gets underway at 10 a.m. daily at the Newtown Paddocks.

New York sires represented at the sale include Gold Fever, Judge T C, Phone Trick, Prime Timber, Ormsby, Regal Classic, and Wheelaway.

Gold Fever has a colt in the sale from a very fast family.

The 20th anniversary of the Maryland Million, the innovative program that shifts racing's focus onto Maryland's stallions and farms, was emotional, thrilling, and, at times, nearly unbelievable.

Delayed one week when torrential rain forced Laurel Park to cancel racing on its scheduled date, this year's Maryland Million, which offered $1.48 million in purses, was conducted on Oct. 15. The weather was perfect, and the event attracted 102 runners for its 12-race card.

The trend toward larger books of mares is continuing, statistics released Thursday by The Jockey Club indicate.

The organization said that based on the current returns of its Reports of Mares Bred, a total of 58,739 mares went to 3,097 stallions during the 2005 North American breeding season. The Jockey Club said the statistics cover approximately 90 percent of the mares bred this year, and, based on past experience, it expects another 800 to 1,000 mare reports from 2005 to be returned.

Island Sand, winner of the 2004 Acorn and runner-up to Ashado in last year's Kentucky Oaks, has been retired from the track and will be bred to A.P. Indy in 2006, trainer Larry Jones said Wednesday.

A 4-year-old Tabasco Cat filly, last ran in the Beldame, finishing seventh behind Ashado. Jones and Island Sand's owner, Jim Osborne of B.A. Man Stable, had been pointing the filly toward the Oct. 29 Breeders' Cup Distaff. But Jones said a recurring breathing problem prompted them to retire her instead.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Fall is stud-fee season, a time when stallion operations set their prices for the coming breeding season and breeders eagerly await word of which horses are moving up or down in cost. Among the farms putting out their rosters this week were Overbrook Farm and Walmac Farm in Lexington and Northview Stallion in Maryland.

The longtime manager of Airdrie Stud, Tim Thornton, has been named Kentucky Farm Manager of the Year for 2005.

The Kentucky Thoroughbred Farm Managers Club's selection committee, headed by Ted Bates of Bates Farm, bestowed the award, which it grants annually to a manager who has shown "hard work and dedication" in a career. The club will honor Thornton at its annual dinner-dance on Dec. 2 in Lexington.