Sheikh Mohammed al Maktoum's Darley organization announced Monday that its 2003 Dubai World Cup winner, Moon Ballad, and Group 1 winner Grandera have been retired to Yushun Company's farm in Japan.

Moon Ballad, 4, is by Singspiel out of the Group 2-winning Shaadi mare Velvet Moon. In addition to his World Cup victory, he also won the Group 2 Dante and Group 3 Select Stakes in England and a United Arab Emirates Grade 3 race, the Maktoum Challenge-Round 2. He also was third in the Epsom Derby last year. He retires with a record of 12-4-3-1 and $4,262,640 in purses.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Answer Lively, the Eclipse Award juvenile champion for 1998, has died at age 7.

Answer Lively died of heart failure at John Franks's Twin Oaks Farm in Texas on April 28, according to a spokesperson for Franks.

Answer Lively, Franks's homebred son of Lively One, was voted champion after winning the Breeders' Cup Juvenile and Louisiana's Sport of Kings Futurity. He also was second in the Louisiana and Remington Park derbies, Lane's End Breeders' Futurity, and Risen Star Stakes in a two-year career.

Northern Sunset, 1995 Broodmare of the Year and the foundation mare for Virginia Kraft Payson's successful homebreeding program, died Thursday at Payson Stud in Kentucky. The mare was euthanized following a stroke. She was 26.

Tom Ventura, general manager of the Ocala Breeders' Sales Company, is a conservative forecaster when it comes to predicting sales trends. But he has high hopes for the OBS fall mixed sale, which begins Monday.

"I think this sale is going to be a good sale, as good as last year and conceivably better," he said.

The Barretts October preferred yearling sale on Tuesday showed growth compared to last year, leaving organizers optimistic about further improvement in coming years.

Overall, 236 horses sold for $3,214,000, an average of $13,619. The gross was an improvement of 18 percent from last year, while the average grew 8 percent. The median grew by 19 percent, to $9,500.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - The Tattersalls October yearling sale's first segment ended a powerfully bullish run Friday in Newmarket, England, setting records for its top price, gross, average, and median.

The Tattersalls October yearling sale in Newmarket, England, continued its strong run Thursday at its third session. A $561,120 Giant's Causeway colt topped the day's proceedings on a final bid from Demi O'Byrne, the agent for John Magnier and Michael Tabor.

Magnier is head of Coolmore Stud, which stands the colt's sire, Giant's Causeway.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Buying a good racehorse is tough to do, but breeding one is even harder. One might compare breeding good racehorses to exploring for gold and diamonds, and in that regard, the game was a natural for Charles Fipke, whose homebred Perfect Soul came home a winner in the Grade 1 Shadwell Turf Mile at Keeneland on Oct. 4.

The Maryland breeding industry is getting a powerful push in 2004, thanks to a new stallion farm backed by a phalanx of investors, including Kentucky breeding powerhouse Lane's End.

The Maryland Stallion Station, which is set to stand five stallions for the 2004 season, is a dramatic development in one of the nation's oldest and most historic Thoroughbred breeding regions. And it will be built on land that is part of breeding history.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - William Schettine, who recently decided to withdraw almost 57 horses from the Keeneland November sale, has sold 37 broodmares privately to Eugene Melnyk.

The package includes Felicita, dam of Grade 1 winner Take Charge Lady, who added to her illustrious record last Sunday with her second consecutive win in Keeneland's Spinster Stakes. Felicita was among the mares Schettine initially planned to disperse at the November sale, citing a lack of time to manage his bloodstock operation.