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Speightstown Colt Tops Fasig-Tipton Winter Mixed Opener

A yearling colt by Speightstown (hip 128) brought the top price during Monday's opening session of the Fasig-Tipton Winter Mixed Sale when bringing a final bid of $165,000 from Calumet Farm. Consigned by Stuart Morris, the yearling was one of four offerings to bring six figures during the day.

In all, 207 horses sold Monday for a gross of $3,956,300. The average was $19,113 and the median was $8,000. The buy-back rate for the session was 21.6%.

“I thought the activity today was very encouraging,” said Fasig-Tipton President Boyd Browning, Jr. “A lot of horses got moved at fair prices. It was a fairly consistent marketplace with no real surprises. There was significant demand for what were perceived to be the quality offerings and there was reasonable trade for the less expensive offerings. I'm not going to say it was crazy, but there was activity.”

The results remained fairly consistent with the opening session of the 2020 auction, which saw 180 head sell for $3,369,200 for an average of $18,718 and a median of $8,000. The buy-back rate for that session was 28.9%.

“I feel like it's a very fair market,” Morris said. “I don't know that I would call it robust or electric, but it's a very fair market. For what I walked up there with, I feel like my results were what they should have been. I got tough with a couple, but I've had several RNA's sold after the fact today, so I think it's a very healthy and fair market.”

Morris consigned Monday's session topper on behalf of his father Jeffry Morris's Highclere, which bred the yearling.

“He's a lovely colt with a lot of future in him,” Morris said. “He's a late April foal and had all of the right parts and pieces. He's very athletic with a good walk and great balance. He was good and correct, but he was definitely going to be a horse with a lot of improvement and growth in him because of his birthday. We were happy with the result and very flattered that an operation like Calumet bought him from us. We are wishing them the best of luck and we're hoping they can make him one of their stakes horses.”

The colt is out of Royal Ancestry (Distorted Humor), a full-sister to Grade I winner Awesome Humor and the dam of stakes-placed More Royalty (More Than Ready). Stuart Morris signed the ticket to acquire the then-11-year-old mare for $9,000 at the 2019 OBS Winter Mixed Sale.

“She was a beautiful mare with a great pedigree under her and some nice production,” Morris said of that purchase. “But she had had some production history issues around the time that we purchased her. We spoke to the folks taking care of her and felt that it was something we could manage and we got her bought for a fair price because of her production history. We got her home and she's just been an absolute star for us. She had this foal late last year and we didn't breed her back just because it was a late cover. She is back on the books this year and I believe she's going to go to Bolt d'Oro for my father.”

The Fasig-Tipton Winter Mixed Sale continues with what is expected to be a lively final session Tuesday.

“We've got a really nice group of horses to sell tomorrow,” Browning said Monday evening. “There are some high-quality offerings in the supplement and I think we'll have some fireworks tomorrow. And we'll have some really nice horses throughout the day.”

Bidding at Newtown Paddocks begins Tuesday at 10 a.m.

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Fasig-Tipton Winter Mixed Sale Starts Monday

The Fasig-Tipton Winter Mixed Sale, ideally positioned just ahead of next week's start of the breeding season, opens for its two-day run Monday morning at Newtown Paddocks. Hips one through 324, a collection of racing and breeding prospects and short yearlings, will be offered Monday and will be followed Tuesday by hips 325 through 673. Bidding begins each day at 10 a.m.

“I've always really liked this sale because of its timing,” said consignor Zach Madden, whose Buckland Sales brings a 13-horse consignment into the auction. “There is a little bit of an urgency, a little bit of a, 'Hey this is my last chance to pick up a mare to breed something this year.' I definitely think there is an urgency to get stuff done.”

Brendan Gallagher, whose Frankfort Park Farm has a 10-horse offering at the sale, agreed.

“It's the last opportunity to invest before the stud season for people that want to buy mares to breed to certain stallions and shareholders,” Gallagher said. “It's always been a decent sale for quality. So that's going to be the same old story.”

But consignors are still expecting to see the common polarization in the marketplace, with high demand for the perceived quality offerings and lesser demand at lower ends of the market.

“We have a mare in foal to Street Sense who will make money and we have a lovely Nyquist filly who will make money and then some of the rest of them might be just a bit more difficult,” Gallagher said. “But the good ones will sell well, which I suppose we can live with. The day when we have the good horses and we don't have trade, well then we're all in trouble. So that's the way it is and it's going to be the same.”

The Winter Mixed sale is the third major auction of the year, following the Keeneland January Horses of All Ages Sale and the Ocala Breeders' Sales Company's Winter Mixed Sale. Both of those previous sales proved there is still demand in the marketplace which has shown its resiliency as buyers and sellers adjust to the new normal in the wake of the global pandemic.

“I would just say from looking at the other sales that the good individuals will still sell well,” said Ron Blake, whose Blake-Albina Thoroughbred Services has 19 horses on offer at Fasig-Tipton this week. “I think there is probably less demand for horses that are not at that top level. Of course that's the way it's been for a while, but during the pandemic, I think it's even more stressed. If you make it into that top 10% or 20% of the horses, you can still get very good money, but if you fall below that, it can be a crap shoot depending on how far below that you fall. I think if you still have a good horse, there is plenty of money for it.”

Despite the swirling uncertainties caused by the ongoing pandemic, Madden and Gallagher both see reasons to be optimistic about the state of the market.

“I had friends and clients that sold at OBS, and obviously we were over at Keeneland in January, and the good news, I think, is you really didn't have that doom and gloom and people with their chins down,” Madden said. “It seemed like when we were first getting the sales back going, people were just wondering what was happening. But people know the reality now. So I feel like that whole doom-and-gloom aspect is out of it. And at the end of the day, most of us are eternal optimists. I do think people still want quality and they are very tough on vetting and all of that other stuff, but I just feel like the worst–knock on wood–is over. We are all battle tested now, so while we still have things to overcome, I think we can still see the light at the end of the tunnel.”

With Gulfstream Park and Sam Houston Race Park among the most recent tracks to announce record handle figures, Gallagher thinks demand for racehorses will only get higher.

“I know the number of foals being bred is reducing and I know that the margins for the breeders–the market for foals is down 27% or something since 2017 and that's a hard nut to crack–but in saying that, the handle at racecourses is going up–we had another record handle there last week with the [GIII] Holy Bull [S. at Gulfstream]. So racing as a sport stands out even a bit at the moment, so if the handle is going up it will have to turn around. And if you have a smaller market because the numbers are going down, I believe that it will come back. I honestly believe that. Demand will go up.”

He continued, “We sell a lot of foals, we'll foal 43 here this year, so for us with that 27% drop since 2017, that's a tough one for a farm like ours. If I was hearing that betting was going down or that people weren't interested in racing anymore, then it might be time to do something else. But at the moment, you have to be upbeat about it because I think it's got to come back.”

Comparing the uncertainties of the 2020/2021 market to the crash of 2008 and its aftermath, Gallagher thinks the top of the market will remain strong.

“The difference from 12 years ago, with the market, the wealthy people took a real hammering,” he said. “I don't think that's happened with the pandemic this time, in general. Yes there is fear there, but it's not as if the bottom has fallen out of financial markets in the world. It hasn't. The top is still there.”

During the 2020 Fasig-Tipton Winter Mixed Sale, 368 horses sold for $9,777,100. The average was $26,568 and the median was $8,500. The buy-back rate was 24.9%.

Twin Creeks Farm purchased the top-priced lot in 2020, going to $570,000 to acquire the broodmare prospect Remedy (Creative Cause), who was one of six to sell for $200,000 or more at the sale.

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Monday’s Racing Insights: Seven-Figure Colt Debuts at Big A

Sponsored by Alex Nichols Agency

1st-AQU, $80K, Msw, 3yo, 7f, 1:20 p.m. ET
Jonathan Thomas sends out $1-million Fasig-Tipton Saratoga grad Will E Sutton (Curlin) for Robert V. LaPenta, Stonestreet Stables and Bridlewood Farm on this card that was pushed back a day due to winter weather. The daughter of debut winner and stakes-placed juvenile Yes Liz (Yes It's True) sports an upbeat tab over the Belmont training track. TJCIS PPs

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Russell Calls Decision To Enter Hello Hot Rod In FT Winter Mixed Sale ‘A Good Business Move’

As a trainer, Brittany Russell knows the best time to take a chance is when a horse is doing well. She shipped Hello Hot Rod from her Laurel Park base to New York last weekend, where the Maryland-bred half-brother of multiple stakes winner Hello Beautiful extended his win streak to three races in Aqueduct's Jimmy Winkfield Stakes.

As an owner, Russell hopes to experience similar success when Hello Hot Rod goes through the ring Feb. 9 on the second of Fasig-Tipton's two-day winter mixed sale in Lexington, Ky. The sale begins both days at 10 a.m. ET.

Russell co-owns Hello Hot Rod, a 3-year-old Mosler colt out of the Tiznow mare Hello Now, with Dark Horse Racing. Consigned by ELiTE Sales, he is cataloged as Hip No. 672.

Hello Hot Rod fetched $10,000 out of Fasig-Tipton's 2019 Midlantic Eastern Fall Yearling Sale at the Maryland State Fairgrounds in Timonium. He has won three of four starts and $113,941 in purse earnings.

“This is a business and it just seemed like sort of a good business move after winning the stake up there. I have some friends between Fasig and ELiTE sales and I thought it was a good move,” Russell said Thursday. “Naturally, I'd love to have him in the barn and keep him and race him, and maybe that can still happen, but we're going to put him through and just see what happens.”

Hello Hot Rod debuted running second by a neck to Doubleoseven in a six-furlong waiver maiden claimer last Oct. 30. He returned to capture a similar spot going seven furlongs Nov. 13 by 4 ½ lengths, then stepped up to win a one-mile optional claiming allowance triumph by 2 ¼ lengths Dec. 13 in his juvenile finale. All three races came at Laurel.

“He's the right kind. This is the right kind of horse at this time of year,” Russell said. “He's won at a mile. He already has that, and he's a stakes winner. He's done nothing wrong. That's what it comes down to. He's a racehorse.”

Hello Hot Rod was a determined front-running head winner of the seven-furlong Jimmy Winkfield, the first time he didn't go off as the favorite. He returned to Laurel later that evening, ahead of the winter storm that gripped the New York and Washington, D.C. metropolitan areas.

“He's awesome. We got lucky with the snow. It started later up in New York so we were able to get him home right away,” Russell said. “He's wonderful. You wouldn't even know he ran. He trained this morning and he's in good form.”

Russell has Wonder Stables, Robert LaPenta and Madaket Stables' Little Huntress in the seven-furlong Ruthless for 3-year-old fillies Feb. 7 at Aqueduct. A 14-length maiden special weight winner Dec. 27 at Laurel, the Frosted filly is also nominated to Laurel's $100,000 Wide Country going seven furlongs Feb. 13.

Little Huntress drew Post 4 in the Ruthless against just four other rivals.

“I entered Little Huntress in the Ruthless this morning because it [is] a short field. We're going to take a look at it and, obviously, we're going to heavily consider running Sunday there,” Russell said. “If we opt to skip, she'll run here in the stakes next week.”

Meanwhile, Russell will send out Cash is King, D.J. Stable and LC Racing's Mine Not Mine in Friday's eighth race, a one-mile allowance for Maryland-bred/sired 4-year-olds and up where the Golden Lad colt drew Post 3 in a field of seven and is 6-1 on the morning line.

Mine Not Mine ran third in a similar spot going 1 1/16 miles Jan. 1, his first start in 216 days after finishing 10^th of 11 as the favorite in an open one-mile allowance last May. The winner of that race, Toy, also beat Mine Not Mine in his New Year's Day comeback.

“We were tickled with his last race. To be honest, he was far from being tight to go two turns … meaning he was at least two works short,” Russell said. “He could have used a little bit more, but he was doing well and he was working well so we thought, let's just give him a race and that should really put him right for this next race.”

Mine Not Mine, also by Golden Lad, made his first two starts for trainer Claudio Gonzalez. In his first two starts after being sold for $210,000 in December 2019 and moved to Russell, Mine Not Mine ran second and third, respectively, to the Gonzalez-trained Lebda in the 2020 Miracle Wood and Private Terms at Laurel.

“He's a horse that we've had high expectations for from Day 1 and he's had some hiccups along the way. You're just kind of hoping that every time you run him, maybe this is his chance to shine,” Russell said. “He seems like he's great right now. He's on good foot in the morning so I certainly expect to see a good effort from him.”

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