Under his Quarter Pole Enterprises banner, noted yearling-to-juvenile reseller Eddie Woods signed for the two top horses during Wednesday's second and final session of the OBS October Sale in Central Florida. The veteran horseman paid $250,000 for a colt by promising young sire Mitole about a third of the way through the session and hung around to the bitter end, when he gave $150,000 for a colt from the first crop of Global Campaign (Curlin). The topper was the most-expensive at the October Sale since 2018, when a colt by Cairo Prince was knocked down for $340,000.
Over the course of two days of trade, OBS reported sales on 386 yearlings for gross receipts of $7,692,100, good for an average price of $19,928. The number declined by 25.7% from last year's sale–which featured a 'select' session followed by an open session–when 394 horses sold for $10,560,900 or an average of $26,804. The median also took a hit, dropping 26.5% to $12,500. In 2022, some 15 horses sold in excess of $100,000, while seven crossed the six-figure threshold this year.
“The horses near the top of the market sold good, but at the lower levels of the market, there certainly was some weakness,” said OBS President Tom Ventura. “I think it's the nature of the market reacting. We have been spoiled somewhat post-pandemic where the market has been moving, even in the face of increased interest rates and the financial markets and the general financial situation. We just keep doing what we can, recruiting horses, recruiting people trying to put the best product we can in front of our clientele.”
Woods struck first for hip 507, a Sue Vacek-consigned Florida-bred son of Mitole and Midnight Magic (Midnight Lute) and was the recipient of a positive update when his half-sister, last year's GIII Delaware Oaks heroine and two-time OBS graduate Midnight Stroll (Not This Time), padded her resume with a close runner-up effort in the GII Presque Isle Downs Masters S. Sept. 18.
With time ticking away on the sale, Woods snapped up hip 745, another Florida-bred, who fetched $82,000 when offered as a short yearling at the OBS January Sale. The late February foal was consigned to the October Sale by Richard Kaizen's Kaizen Sales, agent.
“The two horses I bought, I loved. I didn't think I could get them bought, but I did,” Woods said. “I might have stretched on the [Mitole] a little bit, but gosh, he's gorgeous, by a sire that's on the come with a fashionable pedigree, he just did everything right and that mare throws a good-looking horse.
“The Global Campaign was a magnificent-looking horse, it's just a family of runners. He looked a bit like [the stakes-winning] A. J. Melini (Matty G) [who appears in the second dam], that's a horse I had for Marion Montanari once upon a time, just a bit of a stronger version of him. Two really good, strong, physical colts.”
Ice Cold, a 2-year-old daughter of Mitole and a graduate of the Woods program, won the Oct. 4 Miss Indiana S., and the consignor thinks Mitole is a stallion with a bright future.
“They're showing up and as they get older, they're starting to get a little bit better, which is a good sign,” he said. “I thought they may be a little quick and early, but they're getting a route of ground and that usually augurs for a decent kind of stallion.”
Both of Woods's purchases are naturally ticketed for next year's breeze-up sales, and Woods is equal parts pragmatic and optimistic.
“We've got a long ways to go,” he said. “If everything goes right, they're perfect for resale candidates. They need to be quick, they need to vet well and have good videos. But they both move really well, they're both quite handsome and there's no reason to think they wouldn't do well going forward.
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