LEXINGTON, Ky. - One big winner at Keeneland's select 2-year-old sale last week was one of its smallest consignors. That was equine dentist Jon Jazdzewski, whose one-horse consignment earned $230,000 for its Cat Dreams filly out of Siphonophora.

That might not sound like much when you compare it with the sale-topping Storm Cat colt's $800,000 price tag. But when you consider that Jazdzewski's filly cost him just $10,000 at the Keeneland September yearling sale last year, Hal Earnhardt's winning bid for the filly - whose sire is a son of Storm Cat - looks very good indeed.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - In a development that rocked the bloodstock sales industry, the Fasig-Tipton auction house announced Thursday that it has been purchased by Synergy Investments Limited, a Dubai-based company with close ties to Sheikh Mohammed al-Maktoum.

The announcement issued Thursday afternoon described Synergy as being headed by Abdulla al-Habbai, "a close associate of Sheikh Mohammed."

The veterinarian who has been compiling statistics on fatal racetrack injuries for the past year has revised her initial estimates to show that horses running on synthetic surfaces suffer fatal injuries at a lower rate than horses running on dirt surfaces.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - News of Storm Cat's declining fertility was still fresh on the pages of every major Thoroughbred trade publication Wednesday night when auction-goers arrived at Keeneland's select 2-year-old sale. But the celebrated stallion, now 25 and winding down, proved he's still king in the auction ring when one of his sons topped the sale at $800,000.

Synergy Investments Ltd., a company associated with Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, has reached an agreement to purchase Fasig-Tipton Company, the second-largest horse auction house in the U.S., Fasig-Tipton announced on Thursday.

According to a release, Synergy is owned by Abdullah al Habbai of Dubai. The release said that John Ferguson, a representative of Sheikh Mohammed, approached Fasig-Tipton about acquiring the company prior to the agreement being reached.

Terms of the sale were not disclosed.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Cool Coal Man's gray half-brother took a star turn in the auction ring Tuesday night, topping the first session at Keeneland's select 2-year-old sale on a final bid of $700,000.

Jess Jackson's winning bid gave a handsome payoff to the Langfuhr colt's sellers, a partnership headed by consignor Niall Brennan and partner Mike Ryan that picked the colt out of Keeneland's 2007 September yearling sale, where he sold for $135,000.

The U.S. Trustee's office has filed a motion in a Kentucky federal court requesting that the bankruptcy status of a former commercial breeding partnership, ClassicStar, be changed from Chapter 11 to Chapter 7.

The move, if granted, would convert ClassicStar's bankruptcy protection from business reorganization to liquidation. The motion was filed late last month and has since been supported by the Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors, appointed by the U.S. Trustee's office.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - At Monday's under-tack preview for the Keeneland April 2-year-old sale, workout times were generally very fast. Seven 2-year-olds breezed an eighth of a mile in under 10 seconds, and the fastest among them, at 9.6 seconds, was Cool Coal Man's half-brother.

Keeneland's sole under-tack preview for its April 8-9 juvenile sale featured a spate of fast times that included an eighth-mile breeze in 9.60 seconds.

Hip No. 7, a gray or roan Langfuhr colt who is a half-brother to Blue Grass Stakes hopeful Cool Coal Man, fired off the 9.60-second breeze as the day's fastest worker at the distance. The time equaled the record under-tack work for an eighth-mile set twice before: by Unbridled Slew at the 2006 Barretts May 2-year-old sale and by Patricia's Gem at the 2007 Keeneland April juvenile auction.

Total handle through the largest domestic account-wagering operations in the United States - which maintain their betting hubs in Oregon - rose 5.9 percent in 2007 compared with 2006, the lowest annual growth for the companies since the Oregon Racing Commission began tracking total handle in 2000.