Craig Bandoroff | Horse Racing Free Tips

Pin Oak Stud to Offer Remaining Stock at Fasig-Tipton Kentucky

Josephine Abercrombie's Pin Oak Stud, one of the country's most successful Thoroughbred breeding and racing operations over the past six decades, will be offering its remaining broodmares, weanlings, and some racing fillies at Fasig-Tipton Kentucky Sept. 12. Denali Stud will handle the sale as agent for Pin Oak.

Separate from this main group are 14 yearlings which will be offered in the upcoming Keeneland September Sale and an additional yearling entered to sell at Fasig-Tipton's Saratoga Sale. Some 14 retired mares and horses will remain on the farm.

“This has been part of Ms. Abercrombie's plan all along, as we have been selling mares and downsizing the past few years,” farm manager Clifford Barry said. “Actually, in keeping to her plan, we have sold more yearlings than we kept in training the past couple of years.”

Among the 24 horses being offered in September are graded stakes winners Overheard (Macho Uno), in foal to McKinzie; Gold Medal Dancer (Medaglia d'Oro), in foal to Munnings; and Don't Leave Me (Lemon Drop Kid), in foal to Authentic. The 2021 foals out of these mares and others are also part of the sale on Sept.12.

Craig Bandoroff of Denali Stud said, “We have been fortunate to represent Pin Oak Stud for over 15 years. I've always considered it a compliment to have the Denali Stud name associated with Pin Oak and Josephine Abercrombie. Their pursuit of excellence, their integrity and their highest level of horsemanship has made representing them an honor, not a job. Although I'm saddened to see this day come, I'm proud that we have been asked to represent a woman and a farm that I admire and revere. We will do our best to represent not just an accomplished horsewoman and her legacy but an incredible person who has positively impacted many lives through her various endeavors.”

Recognized as the 1995 National Thoroughbred Breeder of the Year, Pin Oak Stud has produced or campaigned over 100 stakes winners. Prominent homebreds to carry the distinct blue-and-gray striped silks include Peaks and Valleys, Broken Vow, Confessional, See How She Runs, Hasten to Add, Laugh and Be Merry, and Missed the Storm.

An active supporter of the racing industry as well as her community, Ms. Abercrombie has been honored with the William T. Young Humanitarian Award and the Hardboot Award, both presented by the KTA/KTOB. In 2018, Ms. Abercrombie received one of the industry's most prestigious awards when she was named the Thoroughbred Club of America Honor Guest.

“The names Josephine Abercrombie and Pin Oak Stud are synonymous with excellence and quality,” Fasig-Tipton President Boyd Browning said. “Ms. Abercrombie is a pillar of the Thoroughbred industry and our local community. Her legacy will carry forward through the lives of the many people she impacted and these Thoroughbred families she cultivated and developed.”

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Bandoroff’s Dream of a Denali Exacta

If anyone sees Conrad Bandoroff on the Churchill Downs backside Friday morning, be sure to check in on him.

With the possibility of a Denali-consigned exacta in the GI Kentucky Oaks, the farm's vice president said the flutter of butterflies in his stomach will probably have doubled in size by the dawning of Oaks Day.

“During the lead up throughout the week, there's always so much going on that you can kind of keep yourself distracted,” he said. “I imagine that Thursday night, that's when it might start to set in, or during the drive from Lexington to Louisville on Friday morning.”

The Denali exacta will be popular amongst handicappers, and if it were to win the payout certainly wouldn't be too extraordinary. While 'TDN Rising Star' Malathaat (Curlin) is the expected favorite, Travel Column (Frosted),the second Denali representative and another 'Rising Star,' was given 3-1 morning line odds as the co-second choice.

“Just to have a horse in the starting gate is a huge accomplishment,” Bandoroff said. “It's not an easy thing to do, but we pride ourselves in raising Saturday afternoon horses, or in this case Friday afternoon horses. We're very grateful that we're going to get to be there for the ride and we'll hope for the best.”

Travel Column with stakes-winning dam Swingit at Spring Ridge Farm. | Mathea Kelly

Bandoroff's connection to Travel Column runs deeper than her success at the 2019 Fasig-Tipton Sale. The OXO Equine colorbearer was co-bred by Denali Stud.

Chris Welker, the owner and operator of Spring Ridge Farm along with her husband, Fasig-Tipton's Executive Vice President Bayne Welker, purchased Travel Column's dam Swingit (Victory Gallop) for $50,000 from the Denali consignment at the 2016 Keeneland November Sale. A full profile on breeder Chris Welker can be viewed here.

“We knew Swingit well,” Bandoroff said. “We had all the foals out of her up until the point that the Welkers bought her and she always threw a really nice foal.”

When Bandoroff and his father couldn't get the mare out of their heads after the sale, they called up the Welkers and suggested a foal share with Frosted. The Spring Ridge Farm owners agreed, and Travel Column was foaled in April of 2018.

“We thought a good Frosted out of this mare would be a very commercial prospect,” Bandoroff explained. “We always had her pegged for Saratoga. Every time we would go out to Spring Ridge and see her, she just kept looking better and better. Chris did so much work with her and the filly really blossomed coming into the sale.”

Bandoroff has a vivid memory of Travel Column's time at the Saratoga sale before she was purchased by OXO Equine's Larry Best.

“We were at the consignment on the first day of showing, standing with Larry and [advisor] John Dowd. Larry had said his game plan for the sale was that he was looking for colts by proven stallions.”

Denali had two Curlin colts in their consignment, both of which would later hit the seven-figure mark at the sale, so Bandoroff said they had assumed Best was on one of the colts.

“As the show went on, Larry would just kind of hang around the consignment,” Bandoroff recalled. “But every time he came, there was this gray filly that kept catching his eye. And that's a lot of how Travel Column was. She had this presence on her. I remember even myself, we would be showing and I'd just look across the way, and there was that Frosted filly. She had that way of capturing your attention. So sometimes you have to call an audible, and Larry ended up buying a filly by a freshman sire.”

Travel Column's $850,000 hammer price was the most expensive sale for her first-crop sire that year and she left Saratoga as the co-fourth highest-priced filly of the sale.

“We knew she was going over well, but for her to bring $850,000 was incredible,” Bandoroff said. “Honestly, we were going to be thrilled if she brought half of what she did. It was one of those where it was the Saratoga magic. But that was just the start of it. She's been a lot of fun from the start of it and it's been a great ride.”

Tabbed a 'Rising Star' on debut, Travel Column has gone head to head with Stonestreet's Clairiere (Curlin) in her three most recent starts, besting her rival twice including a victory in the GII Fair Grounds Oaks in her final prep before the Kentucky Oaks.

“Her Fair Grounds Oaks was her most impressive performance,” Bandoroff said. “Coming off her defeat to Clairiere [in the GII Rachel Alexandra S.], this was just a different filly. You could tell going into the turn, she said I'm not getting beat today. So we're as optimistic as we can be that she's going to put in a big effort on Friday.”

Travel Column will depart from the sixth position in the Oaks for trainer Brad Cox, who took last year's edition of the same race with Shedaresthedevil (Daredevil) and who also has the top choice in the GI Kentucky Derby with champion Essential Quality (Tapit).

“For a period of time at Fair Grounds, Travel Column's workmate was Essential Quality,” Bandoroff shared. “From watching some of the breezes, I can say that she's a pretty tough workmate. She's given him as much as he can handle.”

Shadwell Stables' Malathaat is one of three Stonestreet-bred fillies in this year's Oaks, but she's the only one to have gone through a sales ring.

“I remember when we went out to Stonestreet to look at the horses we would be selling for them,” said Bandoroff. “That filly walked out and it was just like, wow. Sometimes a horse can take two steps out of the barn and you know they're the goods My dad and I were standing there with [Stonestreet yearling manager] Robert Turner and [advisor] John Moynihan and we looked at them and asked what the chances were of that filly actually coming to the sale, because we thought Barbara [Banke] would probably keep her. She was just a queen.”

Malathaat looks to get a fifth straight victory in Friday's GI Kentucky Oaks while making her first start under the Twin Spires. | Coady

Malathaat is the third foal out of Stonestreet homebred Dreaming of Julia (A.P. Indy), a Grade I winner for the farm. She sold as a yearling for $1.05 million to Shadwell Stable at the 2019 Keeneland September Sale through the Denali consignment.

The speedy bay is now undefeated in her first four starts, most recently taking the GI Central Bank Ashland S. for Todd Pletcher, who also took her dam to the Kentucky Oaks for a fourth-place finish.

“She had so much class and quality at the sale and she obviously lived up to that,” Bandoroff said. “Todd Pletcher has handled her brilliantly. She has grit, and while I think some people will knock her and say she hasn't won with that great of speed figures, she does what she needs to do to win. She's a perfect example of the Stonestreet breeding program and how successful they've been.”

Bandoroff said that having a connection to an Oaks winner would be a first for Denali Stud, fulfilling a goal that's been in the back of their minds for many years.

“We've been fortunate to have had graduates win some very big races, but we haven't won an Oaks yet,” he noted. “It's a bucket list race that we would love to win. Being a nursery and having so much of our business focused on mares and their foals, I know the Oaks has been a dream of my dad's and it's a big dream of mine. To have potentially sold, or co-bred and sold, an Oaks winner is, you know, pinch me.”

Denali Stud will have more to look forward to after the new Oaks winner is crowned on Friday with a connection in the GI Kentucky Derby the following afternoon.

O Besos (Orb) was bred by Barrett Bernard and then foaled and raised at Denali. The GII Louisiana Derby third-place finisher will represent his breeder as well as fellow co-owners Tagg Team Racing, West Point Thoroughbreds and Terry Stephens.

“We always liked him as a foal and a yearling,” Bandoroff recalled. “He was a big, strong, solid colt. It's been fantastic for [Bernard] because this is a guy who owns one or two mares at a time, so from a very small group to have a Derby horse, that's what it's all about. We've raised one Kentucky Derby winner in Animal Kingdom and it would be amazing if we could do it again.”

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Yearling Sales Season Concludes with Fasig-Tipton October

LEXINGTON, KY – The curtain comes down on a most unusual yearling sales season with the Fasig-Tipton Kentucky October Sale which begins its four-day run in Lexington Monday at 10 a.m. The auction will be following up on a record-setting 2019 renewal which saw new high marks for average and–from its largest-ever catalogue–gross, and will be held over four days for the fourth straight year as it continues to build its reputation as a must-attend auction for both buyers and sellers.

“This sale has been so good to us almost since we’ve been doing business here,” said consignor Peter O’Callaghan of Woods Edge Farm. “It’s a great savior for one that misses its window at Keeneland, whether it doesn’t quite make the cut at Keeneland and then does well in the meantime and comes back here, it can stand up well and get sold. For a horse that misses his date for some other reason, it’s proved to be a great outlet for them. So I love this sale. I absolutely have no fears of bringing any nice horse here, whether it be an expensive foal or a homebred.”

On a chilly, overcast day at Newtown Paddocks Sunday, O’Callaghan said traffic has been good at the barns through two days of showing.

“We had quite a good day here Saturday,” O’Callaghan said. “I think we had over 70 cards, which is pretty good for here, certainly on a Saturday. And we are tipping our way along quite nicely today. You always look to see some more faces that we haven’t seen yet, but they always seem to arrive here late, whether it’s today or tomorrow morning. You very much have to play it out until the last minute. A lot of the action happens at this sale at the last minute. There are a lot of horses to get around, so we don’t fully know where we stand yet.”

Of the make-up of the shoppers he has seen, O’Callaghan said, “There has been a mix of end-users and pinhookers. You’d always like to see more end-users, but there are a lot of pinhookers here. There are even some of the Irish pinhookers here, that will always be good for the sale.”

He continued, “But like most years here, the top 10% of this catalogue will sell very well and after that it will be touch and go as to what happens to the rest. It definitely trends that way every year. If you’re lucky enough to get one or two at the top end of what’s here, you’ve a good chance of doing well. And if you don’t, you might struggle a little bit.”

Watching the action from Denali Stud’s Barn 1 Sunday, Craig Bandoroff said he expects the prevailing polarization in the marketplace to continue this week in Lexington.

“I’m sure everybody is saying the same thing,” Bandoroff said. “They are going to look at 1,500 horses and decide which 150 they really want. I expect the polarization will be as severe as it’s been any time this year. That would be my guess. There was a period at Keeneland [September Yearling Sale] where it did pick back up and the middle market surfaced. But there was a period where there was none. It was either you got them sold at a price you were happy with or there was the bottom. There was nothing in between.”

Derek MacKenzie of Vinery Sales did find reasons to be optimistic about a potentially more competitive middle market at the October sale.

“I have been actually pleasantly surprised with the market this year,” MacKenzie said. “It’s better than I thought it would be. The depth of the domestic market was better than I thought it would ever be. Keeneland Books 5 and 6 were better than they’ve been in the last three or four years probably and Timonium was better than it had been, too.”

Buyers continue to be selective in their bidding, but sellers can be rewarded above expectations for yearlings who meet all the criteria.

“They have to do three things–and you’ve heard this a million times–they have to be by the right sire, they have to look great and they have to vet absolutely spotless,” MacKenzie said. “If you do hit those three things, you do great. And if you don’t have those three things, you’re in big trouble. You’re scratching and going racing or going to the 2-year-old sales or you’re just letting them go for what they bring.”

In all, 1,008 yearlings sold at the 2019 October sale for a total of $38,258,900. The average was $37,955 and the median was $13,000. A colt by Candy Ride (Arg) topped the auction when selling for $560,000. He was one of 13 yearlings to sell for $300,000 or over.

Last year’s renewal of the October sale has already produced Grade I-winning juveniles Gretzky the Great (Nyquist), who captured the GI Summer S., and Simply Ravishing (Laoban), victress of the GI Darley Alcibiades S.

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A Spotlight on Stress in the Era of COVID: Craig Bandoroff

Working in racing has always been a stressful occupation; a roller-coaster of emotions, triumphs and tragedies, long hours and travel. Add a global pandemic and unprecedented economic worry, with many participants fearing for their health, livelihoods and businesses, and the stress can become almost overwhelming. It’s the sort of topic many people don’t like to talk about, but we asked several industry participants to open about what particular stresses they were feeling during these very concerning times, and how they were dealing with them.

CRAIG BANDOROFF, Denali Stud

This business is stressful ALL the time. Nobody reading this needs me to go into the specifics or myriad ways. But above all else, the thing I have found in my career that really makes this business so hard is that the percentage of success is so small. Racing, breeding, mares, stallions, pinhooking, whichever facet you look at, the percentage of good outcomes is very small. The opportunities to give good news is infrequent. So often when you call someone, it’s a hard call to make.

With COVID, we’re sitting here as the yearling sales approach with no idea what the market is going to be like. All indicators say it will be down and that it will be tough. The big question is are foreigners going to be allowed to attend. And if so, will they attend even if we find a way to get them here? It just adds to what already is a difficult business and environment. Fortunately, there’s people who love it and want to do it despite how hard it is.

I have the advantage of being an elder statesman now. I’ve been through lots of things from caterpillars to recessions and down cycles before. I feel like there is very little that could happen that I haven’t seen. Obviously this is a very different situation, but we’ve been doing this a long time and have managed to get through difficult years before. Because of that, I have the confidence that we will get through this one.

I think the main thing that helps me sleep at night is recognizing what’s important. How much your horse brings at the sale, although it’s significant, in the scheme of things we are just selling horses, not saving lives. As long as we and our loved ones have our health and safety, and we are surrounded by people who love us, those are the things that are truly important. So we need to remind ourselves of what’s important and keep things in perspective.

I find I have to read the news less and enjoy a good book more. I remind myself, Conrad and our team: We can only control what we can control. Finally, remember what our grandmothers told us: This too shall pass.

Would you like to share your thoughts on stress during this particularly difficult time? Email the TDN’s Sue Finley at suefinley@thetdn.com or Katie Ritz at katieritz@thetdn.com.

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