Two New York-breds bring six figures to open Midlantic sale

By Tom Law and Joe Clancy

Fasig-Tipton’s Midlantic fall yearling sale got off to a quick start Monday afternoon thanks to a pair of New York-breds bringing six-figure bids in the opening minutes.

The fourth yearling through the ring, a colt from the first crop of Tapit’s Grade 1-winning son Cupid, wound up topping not only the opening segment for New York-breds but the entire first session on a bid of $160,000 from the Minnesota-based Xtreme Racing Stables LLC. Sold as Hip 4, the colt out of the Stravinsky mare Gottah Penny was bred by Christopher Shelli and Caliburn Farm and foaled at Shelli’s Fort Christopher’s Thoroughbreds in Fort Edward.

Alan Quartucci bought the colt as a weanling for $52,000 at last year’s Fasig-Tipton Saratoga fall mixed sale and he was consigned by Eaton Sales.

Reiley McDonald of Eaton Sales specifically targeted the sale in Timonium for the session topper, liking the extra time with the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga New York-bred yearling sale off the table. He also opted to not sell the colt in Fasig-Tipton’s Select Yearling Showcase or the Keeneland September sale.

“He needed time,” McDonald said. “Then we did not want to be up against it early in the Fasig-Tipton (Kentucky) sale and we didn’t want to crack the yearling market in September. We just thought he’d be a standout here and we thought we’d get some New York trainers and they’ve been here.

“He’s a nice horse. I’ve had him on the farm since Alan bought him. He was a dumpy, little horse back in March and he just stretched and got longer and turned inside out around June, July and we thought he would be a standout here and he was. He is pretty. He just grew up and became a pretty horse.”

The Cupid colt, and another that sold two hips later, helped lead the New York-bred segment of the latest stop on the shifted and altered late summer and early fall yearling sales calendar.

Fasig-Tipton reported sales on 88 of the 119 New York-breds offered on Day 1 of the sale in Timonium, Md., for total receipts of $2,279,600. The average price for New York-breds Monday came in at $25,905 with a median of $19,000 and low buyback rate of 26 percent.

Matt Cutair’s Cutair Racing, with Joe Migliore handling the bidding from the back ring, landed the second most expensive New York-bred of the day when it went to $120,000 for Hip 6, a filly by Overanalyze and half-sister to recent Grade 2 Vosburgh Stakes runner-up and 2020 stakes winner Funny Guy.

Funny Guy, an earner of $553,145, won the John Morrissey Handicap this summer and the 2019 Albany Stakes at Saratoga for trainer John Terranova. The session-topping filly is out of the stakes-winning Distorted Humor mare Heavenly Humor, who is also the dam of stakes winner Super Humor, stakes-placed Three Jokers and five other winners. Each of her eight foals of racing age are winners.

Jon Taisey’s Hibiscus Stables bred and sold the filly, who was born at Waldorf Farm in North Chatham.

“She was going to sell at Saratoga originally,” Taisey said. “I think (the later date) probably helped us a little bit. We got a couple good updates. Her brother Funny Guy was fourth the Forego in that crazy rainstorm at Saratoga and he ran second in the Vosburgh two weeks ago. I think it helped us but down in Timonium compared to the money that’s in Saratoga at that sale it might have evened itself out at the end of the day.”

Hibiscus bought Heavenly Humor for $25,000 at the 2015 Fasig-Tipton Saratoga fall mixed sale, carrying Funny Guy. They later sold Funny Guy for $10,000 and Three Jokers for $50,000. The Overanalyze filly was foaled at Waldorf Farm in Chatham.

“She’s a great horse, she vetted perfect, scoped perfect, has a really good head on her shoulders,” Taisey said. “I wish she was a little bit bigger at this point in time, but we sold Funny Guy down here at the same sale three years ago now and we were lucky to get $10,000 for him then. They brought him back to the OBS sale and he brought 45 so it goes to show you that even with all the horsemen in the world nobody has a crystal ball.”

Sackatoga Stable, which campaigns New York-bred Belmont and Travers Stakes winner Tiz the Law, purchased two of the six most expensive state-bred yearlings in the opening session. Barclay Tagg, who trains Tiz the Law for Sackatoga, picked out both yearlings.

Sackatoga’s first purchase was Hip 97, a colt by Central Banker from leading New York breeders Chester and Mary Broman’s best families, for $70,000. Bred by Sequel NY, Cheryl Prudhomme and the Bromans, the colt is out of the winning Fusaichi Pegasus mare Submerge, a half sister to Grade 1 winner Artemis Agrotera from the family of Stephen Got Even and Baroness Direct.

The colt, the top-selling yearling of the day by a New York-based stallion, was consigned by McMahon of Saratoga Thoroughbreds, agent.

The next for Sackatoga came about an hour later when it went to $92,000 to purchase Hip 138, a filly by Fast Anna named Tap Fast Anna. Co-bred by Harry Landry and Carl Mathiew and consigned by Harry Landry Bloodstock, agent, the filly is out of the unraced Tapit mare Dance by Em.

“Everything’s hard to buy, isn’t it?” Tagg said. “I guess they’re a little bit further along so you know more, or you know a little more anyway. I send them somewhere else to break, so I don’t see them until next January or February or March so it’s not that different. We buy a few every year. Jack buys a few every year. We try to do a very thorough job of it and get the best for the buck. That’s the work you do here. The catalog is a lot of work too. Buying horses is a lot of work no matter what.”

Trainer Mark Hennig was active during the opening session, purchasing three yearlings for longtime client Alan Brodsky and one for new client Little Blue Bird Stable.

Hennig found the shopping and buying “relatively easy.”

“We got what we wanted,” he said. “I didn’t feel like we were scrambling around or had to settle for something we didn’t want.”

Brodsky’s purchases included Hip 2, a colt by Distorted Humor out of the Smart Strike mare Good Omen, for $70,000 out of the Paramount Sales consignment. Hennig usually shops the sales with his owner but didn’t this time around.

“This is when Alan Brodsky likes to fill the coffers,” Hennig said. “We’ve been patient and waited around. Alan wasn’t able to be here which was a shame because he gets a lot of out the sales, likes to be here and he’s actually a lot of help. He’s picked up on this and does a good job. He’s a big help to me.

“We wound up with a Distorted Humor colt form the family of Curlin, a nice Lookin At Lucky filly from the family of Merry Meadow and an Overanalyze filly. … There’s some nice horses in the pedigrees. I try to form a list of what we’re going to look at before we come to the sale. Obviously, you don’t end up with much off that list at the end of the day just because of vettings and other things, but you pick up some that just catch your eye too. I didn’t feel like we were starving for horses, there were plenty of good horses here.”

Source URL: https://www.nytbreeders.org/news/2020/10/05/two-new-york-breds-bring-six-figures-to-open-midlantic-sale/

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Maryland sale offers another Showcase for New York-breds

By Tom Law

New York-breds – at center stage for significant parts of the year with major players in the spring classics and then leading off country’s first major yearling auction of 2020 – play a key role again at the latest stop on the late summer-early fall yearling sales Monday in Timonium, Md., for the Fasig-Tipton Midlantic fall sale.

The two-day Midlantic sale leads off with 120 New York-breds (after scratches through Sunday) in the opening session, which starts at 1 p.m. ET and less than 48 hours after the Grade 1 Preakness Stakes is run at nearby Pimlico Race Course.

Five other New York-bred yearlings are cataloged to sell at the second session, which starts at 10 a.m. Tuesday.

New York-breds were placed in the “Showcase” portion of the opening session purposely, to again fill a void of Fasig-Tipton’s Saratoga New York-bred sale, canceled this year because of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Fasig-Tipton’s Select Yearling Showcase – a combination of the Kentucky-based company’s July, August select and New York-bred sales – also led off with a 164-hip portion dedicated to New York-breds.

Several consignors that included McMahon of Saratoga Thoroughbreds, Vinery Sales, Harry Landry Bloodstock, Royal Bloodstock, Hibiscus Sales and Blake-Albina Thoroughbred Services either didn’t go to the Kentucky sale or brought smaller consignments. They, along with other frequent sellers at the Saratoga New York-bred sale, have yearlings cataloged in Monday’s session.

“We pointed horses for Timonium,” said Hanzly Albina, partner with Ron Blake in Blake-Albina Thoroughbred Services. “We took fewer yearlings we would have taken to New York typically to the (Kentucky) Showcase. The reality is a lot of New Yorker’s couldn’t come down to that sale, it was too much for them to do. We thought that going in, so we held some back.

“When they announced the Showcase for Maryland we were pretty excited. We thought that would make sense, a lot of people in New York hadn’t had a chance to get to an auction, this was one they could get to. You’re going to get less people coming in, so maybe it’s a little safer and they’ll feel more comfortable in Maryland. Plus you get the people in Maryland and Virginia, who are going to come up because this is their sale, right?”

Blake-Albina sold the third most expensive yearling at last year’s Saratoga New York-bred sale, Hip 342, a colt by Constitution out of the Arch mare Akris Queen, for $340,000.

Signed for by trainer John Terranova and named Breadman, the colt won his debut in a 1-mile state-bred maiden special weight Sept. 26 at Belmont Park in 1:35.88.

“He was our highest priced horse,” Albina said. “He sold very well, like an open-company horse and he proved that he is. Which is really what we’re talking about with a New York-bred. We’re not talking about a reduced level of racing, not at the high level. You look at Tiz the Law, he’s been unbelievable, probably the best horse in the country. Now Breadman looks like an open-company horse and there’s a lot of them out there.”

Albina and Blake hope for similar success with their Midlantic sale consignment, which includes Hip 123, a filly by Goldencents from the family of Grade 1 winner and sire To Honor and Serve.

Laoban, New York’s leading freshman sire and one of the hottest young stallions in America, has six yearlings still slated to sell in the opening New York-bred showcase portion. Based at Sequel Stallions New York in Hudson, where he commanded an advertised $5,000 stud fee in 2020, Laoban sired unbeaten Grade 1 Darley Alcibiades winner Simply Ravishing, allowance winner Dreamer’s Disease and Grade 1 Claiborne Breeders’ Futurity runner-up Keepmeinmind over the weekend at Keeneland.

Laoban, fourth on North America’s freshman sire list with progeny earnings already of more than $587,000 and five winners, is the sire of Hip 34, a colt out of the Bernardini mare Marshtini from the family of Valid Expectations; and Hip 118, a colt out of the Wild Desert mare Adriatic Dream and a half brother to multiple stakes-placed Niko’s Dream. Both colts are consigned by McMahon of Saratoga.

Other New York-breds to watch in the Showcase portion include Hip 2, a colt by Distorted Humor out of the Smart Strike mare Good Omen, a half sister to the dame of Horse of the Year and leading sire Curlin, from Paramount Sales’ consignment; Hip 8, a colt by Bodemeister out of the Mutakddim mare Humunt, a half sister to Teuflesberg, from the Indian Creek consignment; and Hip 39, a colt by Empire Maker out of the stakes-winning and stakes-producing Cape Town mare Mischief Maker, from the Vinery Sales consignment.

Source URL: https://www.nytbreeders.org/news/2020/10/05/maryland-sale-offers-another-showcase-for-new-york-breds/

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