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Authentic, Improbable, Monomoy Girl to Fight Out Horse Of The Year

Authentic (Into Mischief), winner of the GI Kentucky Derby and GI Longines Breeders’ Cup Classic; ‘TDN Rising Star’ Improbable (City Zip), a dual Grade I winner and runner-up in the Classic; and Monomoy Girl (Tapizar), who capped a four-for-four season with a second victory in the GI Longines Breeders’ Cup Distaff, are the finalists for 2020 Horse of the Year as Eclipse Award finalists were announced Saturday on TVG.

Authentic is one of three individual Eclipse finalists in four separate categories for the all-conquering Into Mischief, whose daughter Gamine was nominated for both 3-year-old filly and champion female sprinter in a campaign that saw her post wide-margin victories in the GI Longines Acorn S. and GI Test S. against her peers and a defeat of fellow dual-category finalist Serengeti Empress (Alternation) in the GI Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Sprint. Into Mischief’s third finalist is Dayoutoutoftheoffice, who defeated Vequist (Nyquist) in the GI Frizette S. in October before the latter turned the tables on Breeders’ Cup Friday at Keeneland. Nyquist is the lone freshman sire of 2020 to be represented by a finalist.

Improbable, who is also a favorite for champion dirt male, was a convincing winner of the GI Gold Cup at Santa Anita, the GI Whitney S. and GI Awesome Again S. before falling 2 1/4 lengths shy in the Classic. Monomoy Girl missed the entirety of the 2019 season with a series of setbacks, but proved the queen of the mountain in the dirt female division, completing her undefeated campaign with a smooth win in the Distaff over Valiance (Tapit). She later sold to Spendthrift Farm for $9.5 million at the Fasig-Tipton Night of the Stars and remains in training for a 6-year-old season in 2020.

Vekoma (Candy Ride {Arg}) was also named a finalist in two divisions (dirt male and sprinter), while recent Lane’s End Farm import Daredevil is the only other stallion to have multiple finalists, with GI Preakness S. heroine Swiss Skydiver and GI Kentucky Oaks upsetter Shedaresthedevil each in the running for champion 3-year-old filly.

The other Eclipse Award finalists, which include no fewer than six ‘TDN Rising Stars’ are as follows:

2YO Male

Essential Quality (Tapit), ‘TDN Rising Star‘

Fire At Will (Declaration of War)

Jackie’s Warrior (Maclean’s Music)

2YO Female

Aunt Pearl (Ire) (Lope de Vega {Ire}), ‘TDN Rising Star‘

Dayoutoftheoffice (Into Mischief)

Vequist (Nyquist)

3YO Male

Authentic (Into Mischief)

Nadal (Blame), ‘TDN Rising Star‘

Tiz The Law (Constitution)

3YO Female

Gamine (Into Mischief), ‘TDN Rising Star‘

Shedaresthedevil (Daredevil)

Swiss Skydiver (Daredevil)

Older Dirt Male

Improbable (City Zip), ‘TDN Rising Star‘

Maximum Security (New Year’s Day)

Vekoma (Candy Ride {Arg})

Dirt Female

Midnight Bisou (Midnight Lute)

Monomoy Girl (Tapizar)

Serengeti Empress (Alternation)

Male Sprinter

Vekoma (Candy Ride {Arg})

Volatile (Violence)

Whitmore (Pleasantly Perfect)

Female Sprinter

Gamine (Into Mischief), ‘TDN Rising Star‘

Glass Slippers (GB) (Dream Ahead)

Serengeti Empress (Alternation)

Turf Male

Channel Maker (English Channel)

Order of Australia (Ire) (Australia {GB})

Zulu Alpha (Street Cry {Ire})

Turf Female

Audarya (Fr) (Wootton Bassett {GB})

Rushing Fall (More Than Ready), ‘TDN Rising Star‘

Tarnawa (Ire) (Shamardal)

Steeplechase

Moscato (GB) (Hernando {Fr})

Rashaan (Ire) (Manduro {Ger})

Snap Decision (Hard Spun)

Horse of the Year

Authentic (Into Mischief)

Improbable (City Zip)

Monomoy Girl (Tapizar)

Owner

Godolphin

Klaravich Stables

Spendthrift/MyRacehorse/Madaket/Starlight

Breeder

Peter Blum Thoroughbreds

Calumet Farm

WinStar Farm LLC

Jockey

Irad Ortiz, Jr.

Joel Rosario

John Velazquez

Apprentice

Luis Cardenas

Yarmarie Correa

Alexander Crispin

Trainer

Steve Asmussen

Bob Baffert

Brad Cox

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City Of Light’s First Yearlings Shined At Keeneland January Sale

City of Light got off on the right foot commercially with a strong performance from his first weanlings during last year's November mixed sales in Kentucky. Now that we're on the other side of the flipped calendar, the Lane's End resident has continued to show up at the top of the lists with his debut yearlings at the Keeneland January Horses of All Ages Sale, completed earlier this week.

The 7-year-old son of Quality Road was the leading first-crop yearling sire of the Keeneland January sale by both gross and average sale price.

Over the course of the four-day sale, City of Light saw eight newly-turned yearlings change hands for revenues of $1,225,500 and an average of $153,188. His average was more than double the next-closest first-year sire with more than one horse sold during the January sale: Mendelssohn, who moved five yearlings for an average of $67,800.

The most expensive offering of City of Light's January draft was Hip 660, a bay filly out of the unplaced Bernardini filly I'll Show Me who sold to Larry Best's OXO Equine for $400,000. She was the second-most expensive yearling of the overall sale, and she was the highest-priced youngster of the auction's second session.

I'll Show Me is a half-sister to champion Proud Spell, stakes winner No Distortion, and Grade 3-placed Proud Pearl. Lane's End consigned the top filly, as agent.

Best's purchase displayed continued high-level support for City of Light after he bought the stallion's most expensive offering during last fall's November sales, as well. At the Fasig-Tipton November sale, Best landed a colt out of the winning Into Mischief mare Breaking Beauty for $600,000.

The commercial performance by City of Light's foals so far is a strong endorsement from a marketplace that has been high on the stallion since he was just a stallion prospect. He was booked full for his debut season at stud prior to his farewell victory in the 2019 Pegasus World Cup Invitational Stakes, and Bill Farish of Lane's End said the farm had to turn away another book's worth of mares after the window closed.

Bloodstock agent Mike Ryan, speaking at the Lane's End Press Pass event earlier this month, said he has a share in City of Light as a breeder, and he was happy with the two homebreds he had by the 7-year-old stallion.

“It wasn't a surprise to me that his foals looked so good because I have found through the years that these magnificent-looking stallions like Alydar, Secretariat, Deputy Minister, they have the gene strength to reproduce themselves,” Ryan said. “When they're really good physicals, it seems to be pretty common that they all transmit that to their offspring and this was no exception in this horse. His foals were very well-grown. They have size, substance, quality, strength, and they had an aura of class and presence about them.”

Between the initial mare bookings and the Keeneland January sale, breeders showed their respect for City of Light by making him one of the top weanling sires of 2020, first-crop or otherwise.

City of Light saw 23 weanlings go through the ring last year for revenues of $2,592,000 and an average of $216,000. That placed him fifth among all North American sires by average weanling sale price, and second only to Triple Crown winner Justify among first-crop sires. He was also second to Justify by weanling gross among all sires.

“It wasn't a fluke, it wasn't just that one or two were big-selling horses,” Ryan said. “They were consistently well-made, well-conformed, quality horses.”

Bred in Kentucky by Ann Marie Farm, City of Light is out of the unraced Dehere mare Paris Notion, whose runners also include stakes-placed Pointsman and Exotic Notion. Champion turf mare Fiji is in his extended family, along with Irish filly classic winner and Grade 1 winners Java's War, Careless Jewel, Subordination, Cacoethes, and Fabulously Fast.

Racing for Mr. and Mrs. William K. Warren Jr. and trained by Michael McCarthy, City of Light won six of 11 starts during his on-track career, earning $5,662,600, and he picked up Grade 1 wins in each of his campaigns from ages three to five. He took home the G1 Malibu Stakes as a 3-year-old, then won the G2 Oaklawn Handicap and G1 Triple Bend Stakes before capping off his 4-year-old season with a triumph in the G1 Breeders' Cup Dirt Mile at Churchill Downs. His swan song came in the 2019, G1 Pegasus World Cup, where he prevailed through stormy weather and sloppy footing to go out on a high note.

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Shancelot Available For Inspection At Buck Pond Farm On January 22

Grade 2 winner and multiple Grade 1-placed Shancelot, whose 121 Beyer Speed Figure in winning the G2 Amsterdam Stakes was the highest ever recorded for a 3-year-old sprinter, will be available for inspection at Buck Pond Farm in Versailles, Ky. on Friday, Jan. 22.

The open house is scheduled from noon to 3 p.m. Chili and desserts will be served. Those in attendance will have the opening to register for a chance at a free season to Shancelot.

Raced by Crawford Farms Racing, Shancelot won or placed in all six career starts while earning $624,300.

In addition to his history-making 12 1/2 length romp in the Amsterdam Stakes, Shancelot placed in the G1 H. Allen Jerkens Memorial Stakes and was runner-up in the G1 Santa Anita Sprint Championship Stakes and Breeders' Cup Sprint.

By champion 2-year-old colt Shanghai Bobby, Shancelot is one of four stakes horses for the stakes-winning mare True Kiss. That mare is a half-sister to Grade 1 winner Silver Max and a three-quarter sister to Grade 1 winner and successful sire Yes It's True.

Shancelot will stand at Buck Pond Farm in 2021 for a stud fee of $7,500 LFSN.

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Laobanonaprayer Gives Breeder Deronda Another Chance For The Limelight

For a small breeder, having just one stakes-producing mare on the farm is a source of pride for Christina Deronda. But how about two?

Deronda is the breeder of Laobanonaprayer, who will seek a third straight stakes victory in Saturday's $100,000 Franklin Square going 6 1/2 furlongs for New York-bred sophomore fillies at Aqueduct Racetrack.

Deronda, who operates Moonstar Farm in Dutchess County, N.Y., alongside her mother Angela Colyard and sister Patricia Calandro, owns Raffie's Chance – a daughter of Raffie's Majesty who is the dam of Laobanonaprayer. She also owns City Scamper, who produced two-time stakes winning New York-bred City Man, under the Moonstar Farm moniker.

Via the New York Thoroughbred Breeding and Development Fund, breeders of a New York-bred and sired horse, such as Laobanonaprayer, that win on any New York track earn a bonus of 30 percent of the purse money earned, while second and third-place breeders garner a 15 percent bonus. Horses foaled in New York, but by a sire from outside the Empire State, earn a 15 percent bonus for the winning breeder and a 7.5 percent bonus for finishing second or third.

“We're backyard farmers and we love the horses,” Deronda said. “We don't really do this for the money, we do it because we like to do it. Being a New York state breeder, when your babies do something here, it's nice to get some return. We always work hard and help each other out. It's nice to have a couple of good years in the horse business, because one year could be really good and the next could be really not so good.”

Laobanonaprayer, a daughter of second-crop sire Laoban, won both of her stakes efforts in dominant fashion when notching a 5 1/2-length triumph in the Oct. 24 Maid of the Mist at Belmont Park before an eight-length stroll under the wire in the NYSSS Fifth Avenue on Dec. 6 at the Big A.

Deronda said the filly displayed an audacious demeanor from the beginning.

“When she was first born, she had some intestinal problems, so we took her to the hospital, and they cleared her up,” Deronda said. “When we came and picked her up, they asked me 'Did you name her? Because we call her 'Sassy.” She was sassy alright. She was always a very strong-minded filly. Very sweet, but she had an attitude. She was the leader of the pack. You had to be on your game when you were working with her.”

While a young Laobanonaprayer was manageable during her foal and yearling days, her attitude saw new heights when being taken into the sales ring at Fasig-Tipton's New York Saratoga Fall Sale in October 2018, where she brought $17,000 and was purchased by Hidden Brook.

“She was good when people wanted to look at her and she was, for the most part, well behaved during shows. But in the sales ring, she started acting up a bit,” Deronda said. “Every three steps she would start bucking and rearing. She had a real get-me-out-of-here attitude. I put in a reserve for $16,999 and she sold for $17,000.”

Hidden Brook then put her through the sales ring at Fasig-Tipton's Midlantic Sale last May, where she was acquired for $15,000 by owner and trainer Daniel Velazquez.

“When I watched her go through the 2-year-old sale, she floored me. I thought she would sell better than she sold for,” Deronda said. “But I'm glad that she's with a good trainer. He has done such a great job with her. He really seems to be taking his time with her and spaces her races out nicely. Seems like he's always found the right spot for her.”

Half siblings of Laobanonaprayer could see action in the future as Raffie's Chance has produced a now 2-year-old daughter of Algorithms as well as a Central Banker yearling colt.

“She was a really nice filly, very beautiful filly. She had some attitude as well,” Deronda said of Raffie's Chance's Algorithms filly, who was an RNA for $39,000 at the Fasig-Tipton Midlantic Yearling Sale in October of last year. “The mare throws some nice looking foals. I have a [yearling] colt by Central Banker and he has the same attitude that she does.”

Deronda said that Laoban and Raffie's Chance appear to be a good match.

“They nicked an A and now, obviously, they nick an A++,” Deronda said.

Laobanonaprayer, listed as the 6-5 morning line favorite, will be piloted from post 4 on Saturday by Kendrick Carmouche. The Franklin Square is slated as Race 8 on the nine-race card with a post time of 3:50 p.m. Eastern. First post is 12:20 p.m.

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