Obituaries | Horse Racing Free Tips

Grade 1 Winner We Miss Artie Dies At Age 10

We Miss Artie, a Grade 1 winner and well-traveled stallion, has died at age 10, Red Feather Equine Farm in New Mexico announced Wednesday.

The son of Artie Schiller completed his first season at Red Feather Equine Farm in Tularosa earlier this year. He'd been purchased by Zachary Burtt after the horse had previously resided at Ramsey Farm in Nicholasville, Ky.

Bred in Ontario by Richard L. Lister, We Miss Artie was a $90,000 yearling purchase by Ken and Sarah Ramsey at the 2012 Keeneland September Yearling Sale. He was put in the barn of trainer Todd Pletcher, and he made an impact early with a victory in the Grade 1 Breeders' Futurity at Keeneland, at a time when the main track was synthetic.

All-weather surfaces would become We Miss Artie's specialty over the course of his career. He qualified for the 2014 Kentucky Derby after prevailing in a blanket finish over the Polytrack at Turfway Park in the G3 Spiral Stakes. He finished 10th in the Kentucky Derby, then turned his attentions to the Canadian classics.

We Miss Artie became the favorite for the Queen's Plate after a victory in the Plate Trial Stakes at Woodbine. However, he underwhelmed in the classic race, finishing fourth to the filly Lexie Lou. An injury ended his career after the Queen's Plate, and he was retired to Colebrook Farms Stallion Station in Ontario for the 2016 breeding season. He'd later be relocated to Ramsey Farm before selling at the 2020 Keeneland November breeding stock sale for $6,500.

From three crops of racing age, We Miss Artie has sired 16 winners and accumulated progeny earnings of $1.1 million.

His best runner is Artie's Princess, who was named Canada's champion female sprinter of 2020, on a campaign that included wins in the G2 Bessarabian Stakes and listed Ruling Angel Stakes. Other stakes winners by We Miss Artie include Chasing Artie and Whatmakessammyrun.

The post Grade 1 Winner We Miss Artie Dies At Age 10 appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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Southwest Trainer Neatherlin, Original Conditioner Of Kip Deville, Dies At Age 65

Mike Neatherlin, a regular presence in the Southwest training ranks since the early 1990s and first trainer of Breeders' Cup Mile winner Kip Deville, died Sunday due to complications from COVID-19. He was 65.

The Waterford, Texas-based trainer saddled 186 combined Thoroughbred and Quarter Horse winners, with combined on-track earnings of over $2.7 million. He saddled his first starters in 1991, first focusing primarily on Quarter Horses at Trinity Meadows and Sunland Park, before making the switch to Thoroughbreds in the years that followed.

Neatherlin had just recently seen the most lucrative years of his training career, earning over $250,000 for the first time in 2018 and eclipsing that amount each following year.

That was helped along greatly by the ascent of Mr. Money Bags. A Texas homebred for Roy Cobb, the Silver City gelding won five stakes races in his home state, and ventured out to Zia Park in New Mexico for an additional pair of stakes scores, for earnings of $491,376.

Mr. Money Bags was named Texas Horse of the Year in 2019, on the strength of a campaign that included wins in the Jim's Orbit Stakes and Groovy Stakes at Sam Houston Race Park, the Texas Stallion Stymie Division Stakes at Lone Star Park, and the Roadrunner Stakes and Zia Park Derby in New Mexico. The gelding also took Neatherlin into national-level competition, with starts in the Grade 3 Pat Day Mile at Churchill Downs, and the listed Iowa Derby.

Neatherlin was also the first trainer and co-owner of eventual Breeders' Cup winner Kip Deville. He started the Oklahoma-bred's training after the colt was purchased by Wayne Cobb and South Wind Ranch for $20,000 at the 2004 Fasig-Tipton Texas Yearling Sale. Neatherlin then consigned Kip Deville at the following year's Fasig-Tipton Midlantic 2-Year-Olds In Training Sale, where he finished under his reserve at $32,000.

Under Neatherlin's shedrow, Kip Deville started his career racing in Oklahoma, Texas and Arkansas. He won the Texas Heritage Stakes at Sam Houston, then finished out of the money in the G3 Rebel Stakes at Oaklawn Park, before winning the listed Grand Prairie Turf Challenge Stakes at Lone Star Park by four lengths.

That effort grabbed the attention of owner IEAH Stables, which bought Kip Deville privately in the middle of his 3-year-old season and moved him to the barn of trainer Rick Dutrow. The horse would go on to become a seven-time graded stakes winner, with three of them coming against Grade 1 competition, including the 2007 Breeders' Cup Mile at Monmouth Park.

Neatherlin also owned several of his own racehorses, led by six-figure earning Texas-breds Light Up the Devil and Catch the Devil.

Among Neatherlin's successful pinhooks at auction was Airoforce, who he bought for $20,000 at the 2014 Fasig-Tipton Kentucky Fall Yearling Sale and sold for $350,000 at the following year's OBS Spring Sale, through his son Lane Richardson's Richardson Bloodstock. Airoforce would go on to become a multiple graded stakes winner and finish second in the 2015 Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf.

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Washington Trainer Junior Coffey Dies

Junior Coffey, a star running back at the University of Washington and one of the state's most successful Thoroughbred trainers, died of congestive heart failure Monday at age 79.

A three-time All-Coast selection and three-time Honorable Mention All-American at Washington, Coffey led the Huskies in rushing in 1962 and 1964 and played professionally with the NFL's Green Bay Packers, Atlanta Falcons and New York Giants. His pro career included a rookie stint on the Packers' 1965 championship squad coached by the famed Vince Lombardi.

After a knee injury curtailed his NFL career, Coffey turned to the world of horse racing as a Thoroughbred trainer in the mid-1970s, becoming one of the state's most respected trainers at Longacres and later Emerald Downs. At Emerald Downs, Coffey ranks fifth in all-time win percentage at 20.13%. He preferred a relatively small stable of runners and was “hands on” with every horse. “My objective,” he said, “is to have a sound and happy horse.”

Born Mar. 21, 1942, in Kyle, TX, Coffey starred at Dimmitt (Tex.) High School and is enshrined in the Texas High School Football Hall of Fame and Texas Panhandle Sports Hall of Fame. Coffey said he wound up a Husky because Washington assistant Chesty Walker had seen Coffey play in Texas and convinced him to come to Seattle. At that time, colleges in the Southwest Conference were not integrated.

Emerald Downs founder Ron Crockett entrusted some of his top horses to Coffey including 2012 Belle Roberts winner Cielator and 2007 Longacres Mile runner-up Raise the Bluff.

“Junior Coffey was one of a kind in so many ways,” Crockett said. “He was an accomplished athlete, a talented horse trainer, a philosopher, a friend to many and most of all kindhearted. He was a trailblazer.”

Coffey won 174 races at Emerald Downs, including eight stakes races. He conditioned the filly Run Away Stevie to nine stakes victories including stakes triumphs at both Longacres and Emerald Downs. In his final start as a trainer, Coffey saddled Levitation to a neck victory under Rocco Bowen on Sept. 23, 2018.

Coffey is survived by his wife, Kathy. Funeral arrangements are pending.

The post Washington Trainer Junior Coffey Dies appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

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Hay Jude, Dam Of Breeders’ Cup Winner Little Mike, Dies At Age 26

Hay Jude, the dam of 2012 Breeders' Cup Turf winner Little Mike, died of an apparent heart attack at Old Friends Equine Retirement's annex farm, the farm announced Monday. She was 26.

The Illinois-bred daughter of Wavering Monarch raced as a homebred for Long Meadow Stables, competing exclusively in her home state and becoming a multiple allowance winner. She retired with five wins in 30 starts over five seasons of racing for earnings of $113,152.

After her racing career, Hay Jude entered the Florida broodmare band of horseman Carlo Vaccarezza, and her second foal was the Tiger Ridge gelding Little Nick, who became a three-time stakes winner in Florida and New York.

Her most notable work as a broodmare came with her fourth foal, the Spanish Steps gelding Little Mike, who earned over $3.5 million on the racetrack, with Grade 1 wins in the Breeders' Cup Turf, Arlington Million, and Woodford Reserve Turf Classic Stakes in 2012, and another top-shelf victory in the G1 Joe Hirsch Turf Classic Invitational Stakes a year later.

Like Hay Jude, Little Mike was retired to Old Friends, and he currently resides at the farm.

After the success of Little Mike's 2013 campaign, Hay Jude was offered at that year's Fasig-Tipton November Sale in foal to Distorted Humor, but she was kept by Vaccarezza, finishing under her reserve with a final bid of $235,000.

Hay Jude was pensioned from her broodmare career after delivering the Liam's Map filly Little Jewel in 2016. In total, she produced 12 foals, with eight winners from 10 starters.

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