America’s Best Racing and handicapper (and avid gambler) Monique Vág team up to provide horseplayers with their best bets of the weekend. Vág will identify her top picks as well as at least one longshot play of the weekend, a nice opportunity to swing for the fences on a win bet or to take a shot with a show bet. She also will occasionally look for strong exacta plays for the weekend or try to spot a nice opportunity for other wagers. This Weekend’s Bets
Month: August 2021
Justify Yearlings Primed for the Saratoga Spotlight
The energy seems to be building by the hour now that the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga Select Sale yearlings are in place as buyers sift through the barns surrounding the famed Humphrey S. Finney Pavilion. There's much to look forward to in this 100th edition of the auction, including a sample of the highly-anticipated first crop of yearlings from Triple Crown champion Justify (Scat Daddy – Stage Magic, by Ghostzapper).
With 10 sons and daughters of Justify currently slated to go through the sales ring, these youngsters represent the first book of mares the undefeated champion filled during his introductory year at Ashford Stud. The son of Scat Daddy bred 474 mares in his first two seasons with a $150,000 stud fee.
“The quality of mares that Justify has covered has been second to none,” Coolmore's Adrian Wallace said. “He covered over 70 Grade I winners or producers in his first book and the quality really hasn't changed in the subsequent two books. He's a horse that was obviously brilliant on the racetrack and he's been brilliant at stud as well. We're now getting ready to see that as the sales start. These pedigrees are replete with quality, which is what you'd expect for a horse of Justify's caliber.”
The hulking chestnut was an easy sell for breeders in his first years at stud, not only because of his accomplishments on the track but also for his eye-catching physical.
“He's a very big, imposing horse,” Wallace said. “He was a $500,000 Keeneland September graduate, so obviously a very good-looking horse. He's very correct, a good mover who stands over a lot of ground, and has a great shoulder and hip. He's very American in the way he looks. He's one of those horses that when you see him, he's captivating.”
Campaigned by China Horse Club, Head of Plains Partners LLC, Starlight Racing and WinStar Farm, Justify took over the 3-year-old division by storm in 2018. From a nine and a half-length, 'TDN Rising Star'-worthy debut victory to a triumph over dual GISW Bolt d'Oro in the GI Santa Anita Derby to securing his place in the record books with his Triple Crown win, Justify retired after his Horse of the Year campaign with a perfect six-for-six record.
“The thing about Justify was that everything he did was with ease,” Wallace explained. “He was an efficient, fluid mover with a huge turn of foot. He had the stamina to last the one and a half miles of the GI Belmont S., but also a horse that was good just over a mile. He had the speed, the stamina and the quality. He had every single attribute you would hope to have and he's a great embodiment of what Scat Daddy was.”
A member of the second-to-last crop of Scat Daddy, Justify was one of four sons of the brilliant Coolmore sire in the field for the 2018 GI Kentucky Derby and is now one of five sons representing Coolmore at stud both in America and Ireland.
“One of the things I'll always remember is when we were looking at this crop of Scat Daddy that included Mendelssohn and Justify, [Coolmore's] Paul Shanahan said to us that we were only just now beginning to realize how much of a loss Scat Daddy was to us,” Wallace recalled. “The horses in those final two crops were amazing athletes, as that was when he was only just starting to get his really good mares.”
As Wallace has overseen the early development of Justify's first crop, he said he has noticed similar trends with the yearlings from the Triple Crown hero and his sire.
“I won't say that Scat Daddy didn't stamp his horses, but it's a trait of the Scat Daddy line that they're all different,” Wallace said. “We stand three sons of Scat Daddy here and all three are exceptionally different in every way. Justify is 17 hands, stands over an enormous amount of ground and is a big, athletic son. Mendelssohn is more medium-sized, a very good mover and very correct. Then Caravaggio is 15.3 ½ and is much more of a sprinter type. They're all very athletic, good-looking horses, but I don't think you'll find one particular type.”
Justify filly out of Easter Lily (Ire) sells as Hip 83 with Eaton Sales.
The same, he noted, can be said of Justify's yearlings, although there are some consistencies he has noticed.
“A lot of Justify's yearlings are quite different, although they tend to be a very good size, are easy movers and are generally correct. There's no real type yet and that may also stem from the fact that he was tried with a lot of European-line mares. He was bred to American-line mares, but also a lot of daughters of Galileo.”
Two Justify yearlings out of mares by the late Galileo will be offered at the Fasig-Tipton Select Sale.
Hip 10 is a son of the successful Aidan O'Brien-trained Together (Ire), winner of the 2011 GI Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup S. The mare is responsible for two stakes-placed horses, as well as an Uncle Mo filly named Thrilling who broke her maiden at Santa Anita in May this year. The colt will be consigned by Hill 'n' Dale Sales.
Hip 83, an Irish-bred filly consigned by Eaton Sales, is the first foal out of stakes-winning mare Easter Lily (Ire), a full-sister to another regally-bred stakes winner Circling (Ire).
“This filly is one-of-a-kind at Saratoga,” said Eaton's Reiley McDonald. “She's a big, strong, beautiful filly with a lot of leg, great scope and a good hip, shoulder and length of back. She looks like a two-turn horse and has all the ingredients that made her father so great.”
McDonald spoke on the rare pedigree the filly has to offer.
“This filly provides American breeders a really unique opportunity to have a daughter of an American sire out of a Galileo mare,” he explained. “We don't get these kind of European families very often in America and that makes this filly really special. I think more American breeders need to capitalize on the Galileo mares. He provides stamina, toughness and heart and to introduce that into our American pedigrees is going to be a really great thing going forward.”
McDonald said he has found a consistency in the Justify yearlings he has worked with thus far.
Justify colt out of Grade I winner and producer Appealing Zophie sells as Hip 41.
“The one thing that I find with all the Justify yearlings is their size and scope,” he said. “They also have the great walk and big shoulder their father has and will really be a great Classic-type horse for American racing.”
Another Justify yearling with a high-profile pedigree at Saratoga is Hip 41, a colt out of Grade I winner and producer Appealing Zophie (Successful Appeal). The half-brother to three stakes winners, including GI Belmont S. winner and first-crop yearling sire Tapwrit, is also consigned by Eaton Sales.
“He's a horse that should be very, very popular at the sales,” Wallace said. “He stands over a lot of ground, is a very good mover and is very athletic. If you look at him move, he really does fill the eye and he's got a great presence about him.”
Justify's Saratoga contingent also includes the second foal from Breeders' Cup champion Bar of Gold (Medaglia d'Oro), as well as a half-sister to 2013 GI Kentucky Oaks victress Princess of Sylmar (Majestic Warrior). View his full Fasig-Tipton Saratoga roster here.
At the Fasig-Tipton New York-Bred Sale, a filly out of SP Southern Charmer (Dixie Union) will sell as Hip 571.
At last year's weanling sales, Justify topped his class by average, with 10 of 17 progeny selling to average $394,563. His top lot in the U.S., a half-brother to SW Supreme Aura (Candy Ride {Arg}), brought $600,000 at the Keeneland November Sale.
With first yearlings this year, Justify's colt out of GISW Zipessa (City Zip) brought $1.8 million to Kaneko Makoto Holdings from Shadai Farms at the Japan Racing Horse Association Select Sale. His only yearling at the Fasig-Tipton July Sale, a filly out of GISW Emma's Encore (Congrats), sold for $210,000.
“The market is judging them very well,” Wallace said. “He has a very strong group of yearlings going to Saratoga and I think they are very indicative of the horse's quality and the type of mares he bred. Hopefully we'll see some fireworks in the next few weeks.”
For more editions of our 2021 First-Crop Yearling Sire series, click here.
The post Justify Yearlings Primed for the Saratoga Spotlight appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.
Here’s The Difference Between Pioneer, Generic, And Compounded Medications For Horses – And Why It Matters
Compounded medications for horses have been in the headlines in this and other publications a lot in recent years, especially in the wake of the 2020 federal indictments focusing on the use of misbranded drugs in racehorses. For a lot of horsemen though, it's not always clear from looking at a drug bottle or box what type of drug they're dealing with, and whether they should have concerns about its safety and legality.
Dr. Dionne Benson, chief veterinary officer for The Stronach Group and former executive director of the Racing Medication and Testing Consortium, presented a continuing education seminar for trainers in July to help them distinguish the different categories a drug may fall into and to determine if the product they're looking at is illegal.
When dealing with prescription (sometimes called “legend”) drugs, the first approved version of a new drug is called a pioneer drug. This is a substance that has been legally recognized by the Food and Drug Administration as a new animal drug and has been subjected to considerable testing to demonstrate its safety and efficacy, as well as the purity of its manufacturing process and the stability or shelf life of the drug. They also must show that the manufacturing process is consistent, and the concentration and purity of the drug doesn't change from batch to batch. Pioneer drugs also must show considerable research to validate their suggested doses and uses, and must meet rigorous requirements regarding their package labeling and advertising to be sure consumers are being presented with accurate and complete information.
The FDA approval process for new drugs is long, arduous, and expensive, so to give drug makers an incentive to go through it, they are permitted temporary patents on new substances. This means that for a limited number of years, the company that went through the approval process will be the only one that can legally produce the drug, allowing them to better recoup some of their expenditures in the approval process.
A generic medication is subject to all the same requirements regarding safety and efficacy, and may only be legally produced when the patent on the pioneer version of the drug has expired.
Both types of medications are also subject to adverse event reporting, so there is a public record of any negative side effects or bad reactions to a given drug or batch of drugs and those events can be investigated.
Compounded drugs aren't subject to any of that federal oversight.
Compounding may only be legally done in certain narrow parameters. A compounding pharmacy may only make a drug in response to a prescription a veterinarian has written to treat a specific condition in a specific animal, and it should only take place when there is no legend drug (either a pioneer or a generic) available to serve the patient's needs. Compounders can legally add flavoring to drugs to make them easier to administer, or take a drug traditionally offered in one form like a paste and make it into another, like a powder. In some limited circumstances, a compounder may legally mix two medications to reduce the amount of needle sticks a horse has to endure. In none of those situations should a compounder have large amounts of pre-formulated compounds sitting on the shelf awaiting an order – that, in the eyes of the FDA, is manufacturing. If an FDA-approved drug is no longer being manufactured or is on back order though, a compounder may make small batches of it but should not be in the business of mass manufacture.
“Compounded medications are legal under some circumstances,” said Benson. “Your vets use them every day and in the large majority of those cases they're using them appropriately.”
Benson has seen a number of examples of illegal compounds floating around the track however – sometimes sold online and sometimes peddled by sales reps.
One of the biggest areas of confusion seems to be what constitutes a generic drug. Compounded omeprazole products are a favorite of compounding pharmacies to produce in bulk, in part because horsemen are always looking for cheaper alternatives to the pioneer drug. But Benson said the patent on Gastrogard and Ulcergard, the pioneer form of the drug, hasn't run out yet, so all those “knock off” versions which people may think of as “generics” are actually illegal.
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Compounders are also fond of getting around this restriction by combining omeprazole with another ulcer drug like ranitidine, with the result often being priced more cheaply than pioneer omeprazole.
“The funny thing about that one is if you're combining omeprazole and ranitidine you're actually deactivating one of them,” said Benson.
Omeprazole works by reducing acid secretion, while ranitidine works by neutralizing acid. You don't need both, and they tend to be used in different types of ulcer cases.
Of course, Benson said, it's true that the FDA isn't likely to show up at your barn and ask to examine your prescription bottles (although, the federal case demonstrates they will take an interest in racing now and then). So why should horsemen worry about the technicalities of drug production?
Benson said that the illegal compounds she has seen often come along with safety concerns. Compounders mass producing a legend drug and selling it as a “generic” version aren't having their products tested like approved generic drug manufacturers, and testing by the RMTC suggests the amount of active ingredient in these illegal substances can be wildly mismatched to what's on the label. Benson recalled one bottle of clenbuterol that had ten times the labeled concentration of the drug, which was “getting into toxic ranges.” Another test of a triamcinolone bottle found it contained just .01 percent of its labeled concentration.
Another trouble with unauthorized mass manufacturers of prescription drugs is that there's no assurance of consistency from batch to batch of the medication, so just because a horseman has given a drug from a pharmacy once with no issue doesn't mean the next batch will be the same.
Many of these illegal substances can also be missing key safety information on their packaging. Benson cited Gastrotec, an omeprazole/misoprostol product which she said is still in circulation, despite FDA warnings about it.
“What's terrifying about this medication is the misoprostol,” she said, pointing out that drug is half of the abortion cocktail used in humans. “In veterinary school, you can't touch this stuff without gloves. All the women on the backside, they're given this to give to the horse, and what's the first thing we do? We put the tube in our mouth to pull off the cap and give it to the horse.”
There was no warning about these human health risks on the boxes or tubes of Gastrotec, Benson said.
Benson said she believes trainers have a responsibility to educate themselves about what is and isn't permissible in the drug-making world. Just acquiring a product from a sales representative or a veterinarian isn't a guarantee it is legal.
“Oftentimes we assume whatever the doctor or veterinarian says is right,” she said. “We don't want to make them mad; we just go along with it. But realistically it's your license on the line. Very rarely does a vet get called into a hearing or have to call an owner when a horse dies.”
The post Here’s The Difference Between Pioneer, Generic, And Compounded Medications For Horses – And Why It Matters appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.
McGaughey: Iselin Likely For Comebacking Code Of Honor; First Captain Eyes Pennsylvania Derby
Hall of Fame trainer Shug McGaughey reported that Will Farish's homebred Code of Honor is readying for his next start and said he was buoyed by the 5-year-old's bullet breeze for five furlongs in 1:01.40 Wednesday on the Oklahoma dirt training track in Saratoga Springs, N.Y.
McGaughey said Code of Honor, the 2019 Grade 1 Runhappy Travers-winner, is likely to return to action in the Grade 3 Philip H. Iselin on Aug. 21 at Monmouth Park in New Jersey.
“He is probably going to run in the Iselin. He has trained very, very well up here. He had a great work yesterday,” said McGaughey, who brought the son of Noble Mission to Saratoga from his Fair Hill Training Center barn at the start of the meet. “I'm looking forward to getting him back.”
Code of Honor, the 2019 Kentucky Derby runner-up, has made one 2021 start, finishing fifth in the Grade 1 Pegasus World Cup on Jan. 23.
McGaughey said First Captain, the Grade 3 Dwyer Stakes winner who disappointed with a third-place finish as the short-priced favorite in the Curlinon July 30, will likely not start in the Grade 1 Runhappy Travers on Aug. 28.
“We're probably not planning on running in the Travers but if something happens where the race were to fall apart, we're going to be ready. It probably will be more likely that the Pennsylvania Derby [on Sept. 25 at Parx] is where we're going with him,” McGaughey said.
The post McGaughey: Iselin Likely For Comebacking Code Of Honor; First Captain Eyes Pennsylvania Derby appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.
