LEXINGTON, Ky. - When Keeneland's auctioneers open the bidding at Tuesday's 2-year-old sale, the auction house will be attempting to continue its record 2002 performance.
Whether Keeneland will accomplish that feat is anyone's guess. The select 2-year-old market this year, which opened in February, has been buffeted by everything from Iraqi war worries and economic downturns to extreme buyer selectivity.
On Tuesday, the Marion County Commissioners, five in all, will vote to grant Eugene and Laura Melnyk's request to zone their Winding Oaks Farm property for agricultural purposes only. This request for a change in zoning bucks the Ocala-area trend of selling horse farms for commercial development.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - Toussaud is the favorite to be named 2003's Broodmare of the Year in Kentucky, and it is easy to see why. Just 14 years old, the mare, a resident of Juddmonte Farms, is the dam of 2003 Kentucky Derby hopeful Empire Maker. But Empire Maker, favored for Saturday's Wood Memorial, is just the latest in a distinguished line of runners. Toussaud already is the dam of four other graded stakes winners: Grade 1 winners Chester House, Honest Lady, and Chiselling, and Grade 2 winner Decarchy.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - An Elusive Quality colt out of Pleas Write was the only juvenile to breeze an eighth-mile in 10 seconds, the fastest time at Monday's preview for Keeneland's April 15 2-year-olds in training sale.
Ciaran Dunne's Wavertree Stables has consigned the colt, who will sell as Hip No. 62 at the auction here. The bay colt's dam, Pleas Write, is a stakes winner by Staff Writer and has produced a winner in American Writer.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - Anees, North America's champion 2-year-old and Breeders' Cup Juvenile winner of 1999, was euthanized Saturday due to complications from a broken pastern. The Unbridled horse was 6 and had been standing his third year at stud at Mill Ridge Farm in Lexington.
ARCADIA, Calif. - The selection process for the annual Del Mar yearling sale has changed in the last 10 years.
Doug Burge, the executive director of the California Thoroughbred Breeders Association, the company that conducts the sale, recalls a time when consignors were not as prepared as they are now.
"When we started revitalizing this sale, and stressing that it is a select sale, we were running into problems inspecting horses," he recalled on Friday. "The yearling would be in the field and the farm manager would go, 'There he goes. What do you think?' "
Beginning Tuesday, April 22, more than a thousand 2-year-olds in training will be offered at the Ocala Breeders' Sales spring sale. It is the biggest sale of its kind; four days of continuous sessions are needed to move the 2-year-olds through the sales ring.
Ordinarily, the annual auction starts on a Monday, but this year the sale was delayed a day because Easter is on April 20.
This is the first open sale of 2-year-olds in training on the Florida calendar, and the first that will test most of Florida's freshman stallions, 12 of whom have offspring on offer.
A fleet-footed filly by the name of Carson Hollow stole the show last Tuesday night in Albany, N.Y.
At an awards dinner hosted by the New York Thoroughbred Breeders, Carson Hollow was named the 2002 horse of the year and champion 3-year-old filly and sprinter. Carson Hollow's breeder, Patricia Purdy, and her trainer, Richard Dutrow Jr., also were honored. The filly's regular rider, John Velazquez, won NYTB's inaugural award for champion jockey.
Maryland has lost two of its most famous pensioners, the venerable stallions Smarten, 27, and Shelter Half, 28, each succumbing to infirmities of old age within a week in late March.
A quarter-century has passed since Smarten and Shelter Half each began his odyssey, but the impact of each continues to be felt today.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - Ipi Tombe's three-length victory in last weekend's $2 million, Group 2 Dubai Duty Free was the mare's fourth consecutive victory against colts, and her emphatic success, racing nine furlongs in 1:47.61, showed beyond a doubt that she is a star of international racing. In addition to her ability, Ipi Tombe has the background and personality to catch public appeal.