MIAMI - Another year, another world record.

Sheikh Mohammed's Darley Stud spent $5.2 million on a son of Tale of the Cat at Tuesday's Fasig-Tipton selected 2-year-olds in training sale at Calder Race Course. The price was a world record for a 2-year-old in training sale, eclipsing the $4.5 million a son of Fusaichi Pegasus brought at this same sale last year.

LAS VEGAS - Charismatic, sire of Kentucky Derby hopeful Sun King, was a late-blooming son of Summer Squall who developed quickly in the spring of his 3-year-old season, winning three straight stakes - the Lexington, Kentucky Derby, and Preakness - before finishing third on a broken leg in the Belmont. Despite being a champion 3-year-old and Horse of the Year in 1999, he was not given much of a chance at stud in this country and was exported to Japan, which like Europe and Australasia, appreciates stamina in pedigrees.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Hall of Famer All Along, 1983 Horse of the Year and a champion on two continents, was euthanized Feb. 23 due to the infirmities of old age, Three Chimneys Farm announced Friday. The Targowice mare was 26 and had been pensioned at the Midway, Ky., farm for the past two years.

All Along is most famous for the 41-day period that gave her the 1983 Horse of the Year title. During that period, she won France's Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe, Canada's Rothmans International, the Turf Classic at Aqueduct, and the Washington, D.C., International at Laurel Park.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Estrapade, champion turf mare of 1986 and the only female to win the Arlington Million, died of a heart attack Friday, just hours before she was to be donated to the Old Friends retirement facility. A Vaguely Noble mare, she was 25.

Smokester, who died last Monday from a heart attack, was a stallion whose popularity grew after a modest start to his career in the early-1990's.

Initially, Smokester was supported almost exclusively by owners Trudy McCaffery and John Toffan. Interest became more widespread after the Smokester colt Free House won the 1997 Santa Anita Derby en route to the first of two consecutive titles as the California-bred horse of the year.

Round 2 of the Florida 2-year-olds in training sales takes place Tuesday when Fasig-Tipton holds its annual selected sale at Calder Race Course.

Terrence R.P. Collier, Fasig-Tipton's director of marketing, is confident this year's sale will be a winner for all concerned.

"There's a lot of confidence and optimism in the market these days," Collier said. "And there's a solid demand for horses across the board."

Collier credited much of this confidence to the work of the National Association of Two-Year-Old Consignors, an organization that promotes juvenile sales.

New York sire Freud, who tied with Successful Appeal as the leading sire at the Ocala Breeders' Sales Company's juvenile sale on Feb. 8, is represented by five offerings in the Fasig-Tipton selected 2-year-olds in training sale at Calder March 1.

Both sires averaged $185,000 for two offspring at OBS.

Successful Appeal was the leading first-crop sire in North America for 2004 in terms of earnings, while Freud, a full brother to Giant's Causeway who stands at Lakland North in Hudson, will have his first runners hit the track in 2005.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - In the many tributes and commentaries on the late John Gaines and his contributions to Thoroughbred racing and breeding, none has focused principally on one of his greatest achievements: breeding top-class racehorses.

Truly, in the scope of his activity, his role as a breeder was quite small. Gaines told me in a discussion several months ago that he "rarely, if ever, had more than a dozen broodmares until the last 10 years or so."

Ron and Betsy Houghton don't mind losing in the claiming game. In fact, they've made a career of it.

Proprietors of 300-acre Sylmar Farm in near Quarryville, Pa., the Houghtons annually bring a dozen or so homebreds to the Pennsylvania racetracks. "We try to run them a few times, and get them claimed," Ron Houghton said.

While racing for their new owners - who pay the bills - the Houghtons' former runners frequently generate breeder awards from the Pennsylvania Breeding Fund program.

Vinery Australia, which announced late last year that it will disperse its bloodstock as owner Tom Simon focuses on his North American program, reportedly has sold its entire 50-foal weanling crop to Arrowfield Stud.

Arrowfield, headed by John Messara, is one of Australia's major breeding concerns. It joined with Vinery to stand Hussonet in 2004 at Vinery's Kentucky farm.

The weanling sale was private, according to reports, but the Sydney Morning Herald quoted an estimate of "around $4 million" in Australian funds.