Crew Dragon | Horse Racing Free Tips

D.M.I. paid $310,000 for Crew Dragon, a 3-year-old stakes-placed, winning colt by Exaggerator, to record the highest price of today's Keeneland April Horses of Racing Age Sale.

Lane's End, agent, consigned Crew Dragon, who is out of the Malibu Moon mare Go Go Dana.

For the one-day sale, 37 horses grossed $2.44 million, for an average of $65,946 and a median of $45,000. Thirteen of those horses sold on the internet for a total of $415,000.

“We are happy with how well the sale was received,” Keeneland director of sales operations Geoffrey Russell said. “We wanted to give people who raced here an opportunity to sell some of their horses before they go to other parts of the country.”

The April Sale featured an enhanced digital catalog on Keeneland.com that included pedigrees, Equibase past performances and race videos, Daily Racing Form past performances, and Ragozin and Thoro-Graph figures. Consignors were able to upload photographs and walking videos.

“The digital catalog allowed us to be more flexible and accept entries later than we typically can with a paper catalog,” Keeneland president and CEO Shannon Arvin said. “We are able to provide a lot more updated information that you cannot do with a paper catalog.”

Bloodstock agent David Ingordo signed the ticket for Crew Dragon on behalf of clients in California. D.M.I. led all buyers with the purchase.

“Keeneland did a great job putting this sale together,” Ingordo said. “The timing of it is good: right before the summer meets. I have been impressed with the trade and the quality of horses. The way they put the catalog together quickly was impressive. I hope they continue to build on this.

“(Keeneland) did a really good job of providing credible videos and information for potential buyers to see remotely,” Ingordo added. “If there is a good thing that came out of COVID for the horse business, it is the speed of producing quality videos. We weren't doing that before. I had to do amateurish videos with my phone and (now) the videos are professional. Most of my clients (did not attend the sale because they) are training horses or running businesses. They appreciate that videos are provided.”

The sale's leading consignor was ELiTE, agent, which sold eight horses for $803,000. Topping ELiTE's consignment were the second- and third-highest priced offerings, Brooke Marie at $210,000 and Secret Time (GER) at $170,000.

Castleton Lyons acquired Brooke Marie, a 5-year-old daughter of Lemon Drop Kid who won a Keeneland allowance race on April 17. She is out of the Giant's Causeway mare Mamasez and from the family of Grade 1 winner Marylebone and Grade 2 winner Alpha Kitten. Brooke Marie has three wins in 11 starts with earnings of $180,430.

Secret Time, a 4-year-old daughter of Camacho who was Group 3-placed in France, sold to Thorne-Spedale Family, John Fahey, agent. Secret Time is out of Song of Time, by Kheleyf.

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Kinsman Stable's Crew Dragon (Exaggerator) overcame a case of third-itis and plenty of traffic trouble to graduate by a gritty neck when trying nine furlongs for the first time at Gulfstream Park Sunday for trainer Bill Mott.

“Our team was very impressed with the gameness he showed fighting through horses to get them at the wire,” Kevin Adler, Kinsman's Vice President and Director of Racing, said. “Bill has liked this horse since the summer and Crew Dragon showed his versatility by getting the mile and an eighth.”

The Steinbrenner family's Kinsman Farm purchased Crew Dragon for $110,000 at the 2019 Keeneland September sale.

“[Kinsman President] Jessica Steinbrenner takes our team to Keeneland to try and buy a few athletes at a reasonable price to send to Ocala to train on her farm,” Adler said. “Crew Dragon had a nice athletic walk, good conformation in front, good shoulder, was decent size with an early birthday [Jan. 23], so physically he checked our boxes. We also liked that he is by Exaggerator from a female family with Distorted Humor in the third dam, so the bloodlines were there as well.”

Crew Dragon is the first foal out of Go Go Dana, a half-sister to graded stakes winner Liam's Dream (Liam's Map). His third dam is Danzig's Beauty (Danzig), dam of Distorted Humor.

The original plan was to offer the colt at the Fasig-Tipton Gulfstream 2-Year-Olds in Training Sale last spring. That was until the coronavirus pandemic intervened.

“[Kinsman Farm's Ocala-based trainer] Emily Dawson has done a great job getting the babies to the sales the past few years and Crew Dragon was training nicely on the farm early,” Adler said. “So we had the intention of taking him to the sale down at Gulfstream. The pandemic forced Fasig-Tipton to cancel the sale, leaving us to navigate around all the changes to the sale dates. We were stuck in limbo not knowing if we would have any sales, so we babied him along, making sure he was sound and happy. Once we had firm dates, we were able to get him ready to send him over to the OBS sale in June to see how he would perform. He breezed well, galloped out strong and vetted clean, so our team decided that we would take the chance and run him. So a few days later, he was on a van to Bill Mott.”

Crew Dragon opened his racing career three months later, closing from off the pace to be third without challenging the top two while going one mile over the Belmont turf Sept. 18. Closer to the pace in his next start, he was unable to keep pace with runaway winner Original (Quality Road) when third again going 1 1/16 miles over the Aqueduct turf. He raced greenly to be third again going that same distance at Gulfstream Park Jan. 2.

“His first two races in New York were encouraging enough, but his third kind of disappointed us, even though he ran against what looks like two really nice horses,” Adler said. “Turf racing is tough, so you have to be patient with the young horses as they are still figuring out how to race and compete.”

Crew Dragon finally put it all together Sunday. Behind a wall of horses at the top of the lane, the handsome chestnut gamely surged between foes when he finally found daylight and just got up in the shadow of the wire for a determined victory.

“Very exciting to watch for sure,” Adler said of Sunday's effort. “You would love to have a barn full of horses with the guts he displayed.”

As for where Crew Dragon might start next, Adler said, “We have been doing this for quite a few years and one thing we have learned is it is best we let the Hall of Famer Bill Mott make those decisions.”

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