Rod and Lorraine Rodriguez live on the cattle and cutting-horse ranch they own in Cottonwood, Calif., 3,000 miles away from the two stakes-winning New York-breds they own.
Geography aside, the Rodriguezes are major players in New York's breeding and racing program with Bossanova and Roman Dancer.
Growing up in Queens, N.Y., is not the usual prerequisite for operating a horse farm in Ocala. Louis Gurino, owner of Lou Roe Farm, knew early on that horses and life on the farm is what he wanted.
"As a teenager," said Gurino, "I used to go with my father to the track. He had a small stable. When school was out, I went to work in the backstretch, started as a hotwalker, and then a groom."
At first Gurino had thoughts of becoming a veterinarian.
"Didn't want to commit to the time it takes to become a vet," he said. "I was too eager to get started."
LEXINGTON, Ky. - Perhaps the winner of this year's Frank J. De Francis Memorial Dash at Laurel Park will cause some platitudes to be reformed. For instance, "To win a Grade 1, you have to break some eggs, or at least some huevos" would be appropriate.
Apparently, however, A Huevo wasn't named for eggs. The colloquial sense of the expression, according to the horse's former owner, Suzanne Moscarelli, approaches "You the man." But in this case, A Huevo isn't. He's a gelding.
Aspen Gal, a 2-year-old filly who has handily won three stakes in her last three starts, has been sold to Edmund Gann for $350,000 and is scheduled to be shipped to trainer Bobby Frankel at Hollywood Park this week, according to her Remington Park-based trainer, Wilson Brown.
Jay Ethridge, a bloodstock agent based in Oklahoma City, contacted Mark Reid, who scouts horses for Gann and Frankel, about Aspen Gal. She is 4 for 5 in her career, and has won her last three starts by 15 1/2 lengths. Aspen Gal is by Talkin Man and was bred in Oklahoma.
Jim Moran has been waiting for a good horse to come along and help put his Elk Manor Farm in Northeast, Md., on the map as a commercial breeding operation. Now it's happened - twice.
The season's first two Maryland Fund stakes for 2-year-olds - the Heavenly Cause Stakes for fillies on Nov. 1, and Rollicking Stakes on Nov. 8 - were won by horses bred and sold by Elk Manor.
The Florida Thoroughbred Farm Managers Inc. will hold its annual parade of stallions and trade show Sunday, Nov. 23, starting at 10 a.m. Stallions will be housed in the Ocala Breeders' Sales Company's north wing, the area near Barns 14 and 18. Stallions will be shown to prospective breeders prior to participating in the stallion parade, which beings at 1 p.m. at the adjacent Ocala Equestrian Complex.
Beginning in 2006, the Ontario division of the Canadian Thoroughbred Horse Society will have to find a new location to hold Canada's premier yearling and breeding auctions because Woodbine Entertainment no longer wants to be involved in sales on its property.
The main sticking point with Woodbine holding the sales on its grounds is that almost 300 active racehorses have to be displaced for several weeks in September for the Thoroughbred and Standardbred yearlings to be housed in the sales barns.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - All Along, North America's Horse of the Year in 1983 and the first foreign-based horse to win that honor, has been pensioned from breeding at age 24.
She is expected to live out her days at Three Chimneys Farm in Midway, Ky.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - The Keeneland November breeding stock sale took everybody by surprise this year by ringing up enormous gains across the board and setting world-record prices of $7.1 million for a broodmare and $2.4 million for a weanling.
The 11-day auction, which ended Thursday, sold 2,614 horses for $236,070,900, up 26 percent from last year's 10-day sale, when 2,377 lots sold. The 2003 average price of $90,310 outpaced last year's by 15 percent, and the $32,000 median was 14 percent up from last year.