Rosilyn Polan | Horse Racing Free Tips

Rags Pauline Tops Fasig-Tipton Digital Sale

The Fasig-Tipton August Digital Selected Sale concluded Tuesday afternoon with 45 horses sold for $500,900. The online auction was topped by Rags Pauline (Union Rags) (hip 2), a 6-year-old mare in foal to Candy Ride (Arg), who sold for $80,000 to Jack Hirsch. Rosilyn Polan's Sunday Morning Farm consigned the mare from its Versailles, Kentucky base.

Rags Pauline is a half-sister to Grade II winner Keen Pauline (Pulpit) and is carrying a foal bred on a similar cross to Unified, a three-time graded stakes winner and top-10 first-crop sire last year. Polan purchased Rags Pauline for $17,000 at the 2020 Keeneland January sale.

Buyers may still make offers on horses that failed to meet their reserve by visiting the sale page, then clicking “Make Offer” next to the horse they are interested in purchasing.

Fasig-Tipton's next digital auction will be the final phase of the Glen Todd Dispersal. Bidding will be held Sept. 22-29.

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First-Crop Yearling Previews: Mitole

The 2022 class of first-crop yearling sires features a diverse batch of Kentucky-based young stallions including a pair of Breeders' Cup champions, two sons of reigning top sire Into Mischief, five graded stakes winners at two and five Grade I winners on turf. Throughout the course of the yearling sales season, we will feature a series of freshman sires as their first crop points toward the sales ring.

Mitole (Eskendereya – Indian Miss, by Indian Charlie) is a barn favorite for Spendthrift Farm's Stallion Sales Manager Mark Toothaker for several reasons, perhaps a big one being that, as Toothaker joked, “He's easy on a guy trying to sell stallion season.”

The 2019 GI Breeders' Cup Sprint champion bred over 200 mares in each of his first few years at stud, including that tough third season where many promising stallions are lucky to get 100. What has made Mitole so extremely popular?

“I think with Mitole, the biggest thing with him was just how fast he was,” Toothaker explained. “Steve [Asmussen] even said that this is the fastest horse in the world. He was hard to beat at any distance and we feel like that's what breeders have gravitated toward is his speed. The demand for him has just been amazing through the first three years.”

Bred by Edward A. Cox Jr., Mitole was a $20,000 yearling turned $140,000 OBS April 2-year-old. Campaigned by William and Corinne Heiligbrodt and trained by Steve Asmussen, the colt out of future Broodmare of the Year Indian Miss (Indian Charlie) got his first win in his third start, defeating a field of maidens by 10 lengths as a young 3-year-old. He got his first stakes win two months later in the Bachelor S. at Oaklawn Park.

“We were chasing another stallion that day,” Toothaker recalled. “When I came back to the office, I told everyone that I may have seen the best 3-year-old in the country. They thought I was talking about the other horse, but I was talking about Mitole. This was April of his 3-year-old year and he got a 107 Beyer. This horse was just incredible.”

Mitole was sidelined after a win in his next start in the Chick Lang S. due to a splint injury, but returned at four to capture six of his seven starts in 2019, including the GI Churchill Downs S. on the Kentucky Derby undercard, the GI Runhappy Metropolitan H. over MGISW McKinzie (Street Sense) and the GI Forego S. in stakes-record time. He culminated his season with a career-high 112 Beyer Speed Figure in the GI Breeders' Cup Sprint and retired with over $3 million in earnings as the 2019 Champion Male Sprinter and Horse of the Year finalist.

Launched with an initial stud fee of $25,000 in 2020, Mitole's fee was brought down to $15,000 the next year when Spendthrift reduced stud fees for most of their roster in 2021. Toothaker said that as the young stallion's first foals arrived, breeders started calling with the hopes of bringing their mares back to him.

“People have loved the way these things look,” Toothaker said of Mitole's first foals. “They have great hips on them, they look like him, and they just look fast.”

Mitole sent 56 weanlings and short yearlings through the ring at the breeding stock sales. 46 sold to average $80,608 and place their sire among the top 5 first-crop weanling sires in North America in 2021. His colt out of Rode Warrior (Quality Road) sold for $285,000 at Keeneland November to Spendthrift Farm and Bill and Corinne Heiligbrodt while another colt at the same sale brought $200,000.

At the upcoming Fasig-Tipton July Sale on July 12, Mitole will be represented by 13 members of his first crop.

“I feel like as we go around and do our notes out there, it's going to be a lot of the same,” Toothaker said. “It will be a horse that looks like we could take to the 2-year-old sale and it could go fast and have a chance to hit a big lick, or, it could be a horse that trainers are going to take to the track saying that we could come out with this 2-year-old and mean business from the get go.”

Brookdale Sales will send Hip 9, a Mitole colt out of the Lonhro (Aus) mare Limit, through the sales ring at Fasig-Tipton July for breeder Mineloa Farm. Martin O'Dowd said that everyone at Mineola has been impressed by this colt from the start.

“He's very, very nice,” O'Dowd said. “He's correct and has a great mind and a lovely walk. In the paddock, he just moves beautifully with a fabulous, low stride. The mare has a very deep family and it's a family that runs on dirt and turf.”

At the same sale, Rosilyn Polan's Sunday Morning Farm will send a Mitole colt through the ring as Hip 51. The yearling is out of Sweetness Galore (Rock Hard Ten), a daughter of GISW Tribulation (Danzig). Polan's favorite thing about the youngster, she said, is his powerful stride.

“I love that he is not only so fluid when he walks, but he's so purposeful,” she explained. “He acts like he's planning ahead with every footfall and just reaching for the finish line. He's a fun one to have.”

Toothaker said that he is anticipating high demand for Mitole's yearlings from a wide variety of shoppers.

“It's exciting because Bill and Corinne were active at the sales supporting him and they're going to try to have these things ready to roll as well,” he said. “I feel that the 2-year-old pinhookers all the way to the people going to the races are going to want to have a Mitole. Everybody likes fast.”

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Sunday Morning Luck Strikes Again at Keeneland

Less than 48 hours after what was arguably her greatest achievements in the horse business, Rosilyn Polan was back at Keeneland with a pair of yearlings slated to go through the ring on Sunday. Earlier in the week during Book 2 of the Keeneland September Sale, her City of Light colt out of the Tapit mare Anchorage became the probable sale topper when he sold for $1.7 million to Woodford Racing, Talla Racing and West Point Thoroughbreds.

But now it was on to Book 3 and the spirited breeder and consignor was ready for round two.

“Of course, as beyond exciting as the Anchorage colt was, now that I'm here with another consignment, that's really behind me and this is where my focus is now,” Polan said at Barn 28 as she stood alongside the stalls of her Accelerate colt and Sharp Azteca filly. They wouldn't bring quite what her first offering sold for, but the duo did fetch over $160,000 combined.

Although the owner of Sunday Morning Farm had her mind set on her final two offerings of the auction, it was clear that most other salegoers were still fixated on her farm's earlier success as a steady stream of well-wishers dropped by to extend their congratulations.

“People have been so genuinely happy for me, people I don't even know,” she said. “People ask me if I expected that [result]. Well nobody ever dreams of even getting to a million dollars. I knew people would like him, but nobody even thinks of liking him for that kind of money. The words haven't been invented yet to describe that feeling. The only thing that would have made the day more perfect would have been to have my daughter Laiken there. She is always such a good help to me and is my best cheerleader.”

The day before Polan's City of Light colt entered the sales ring, another colt by the Lane's End first-crop sire, consigned by Woods Edge Farm, brought $1.05 million.

“I had told a friend of mine, 'Oh darn, I wanted to be the most expensive City of Light at the sale,'” Polan said with a laugh of still a bit of disbelief.

But even after achieving such a monumental goal, the breeder went home that night to commemorate the achievement by catching up on barn chores.

“My celebration is all right here,” she said, pointing towards her heart. “The best thing about what I do is that I go back home and work. I have fly masks to tend to and stalls to tend to. That keeps me grounded and keeps my happy. It fills me up.”

City of Light colt out of the stakes-placed mare Anchorage fetches $1.7 million. | Keeneland

Polan had held a similar celebration ceremony last year, when her Practical Joke colt brought $575,000 at the same auction. Now of course named Wit, he brought attention to his breeder earlier this summer when he became a GIII-winning 'TDN Rising Star.'

“I can't compare the two horses or the two feelings,” she said when asked to describe the similarities between her experiences with Wit and with this yearling colt. “I will say that with both of them, I just felt so special.”

Polan did admit that with Wit, she had not realize how well he would be received until after he was on the grounds at Keeneland.

“He was just so laid back about it but when he came to the sale, every time he came out of his stall he got bigger and had more presence and was loftier.”

But this City of Light yearling was different, she said. “The Anchorage colt was always that way, whether it was at the farm or the sale, he was always coming out of his stall saying, 'Let's go.' At the sale people would comment to me, 'It's four o'clock in the afternoon and he's still marching.' But that was always his type.”

To Polan, his powerful-but-easygoing stride and eye-catching presence was reminiscent of what she saw in the colt's dam six years ago at the Keeneland November Sale.

“I was trying to buy a mare in foal to Will Take Charge,” she recalled. “I wasn't able to buy anything so I went and looked at every RNA after the sale. I looked at quite a few before I saw Anchorage, but from the second I saw her I went, 'Oh yeah, this is it.' I mean she just fills your eye and she's got so much presence. She's a big, heavy mare that looks like she would hit the ground hard, but when I brought her home and turned her out, she went off across the field and her feet never hit the ground -just like mine after that sale.”

Polan sold Anchorage's first Will Take Charge foal for $130,000 at the following November Sale. That filly, named Tijori, won on debut to earn 'TDN Rising Star' status. Bred back to the same sire, Anchorage produced a Will Take Charge colt that brought $280,000. Now named Abaan, the Todd Pletcher trainee broke his maiden earlier this month at Saratoga by over seven lengths.

“She continues to produce fabulous runners,” Polan said proudly. “At home, she's my special mare. I'm sure everyone's going to say that if I sell a million-dollar horse out of her, of course she's my special mare. But she just is. She's such a queen and she's the gift that keeps on giving.”

Polan recalls the stunned sensation she felt when Anchorage foaled her City of Light colt last February.

“I felt like the luckiest person in the world,” she said.

As the newborn stepped up on wobbly legs, she thought back to the photo of trainer Michael McCarthy sending City of Light off to Lane's End alongside his young daughter when the champion retired in 2019.

“In the picture, there he was on the van and the daughter was boo-hooing because she couldn't believe that her horse was leaving. So I got in touch with Allaire [Ryan] at Lane's End and asked if I could send her a picture of this foal because he was so special and I wanted to show this young girl that her horse was not gone. That was my first picture of the foal and from the minute he stood up, some horses give you that feeling and some don't. This one was, 'Oh my gosh, wow.'”

Polan's City of Light colt out of Anchorage thrives as a youngster at Sunday Morning Farm. | Rosilyn Polan

According to Polan, the stunning bay didn't lose an ounce of 'wow factor' from the moment he got to his feet to when he went through the ring at Keeneland.

“He was a beast on the farm and never really went through a gangly stage,” she explained. “All summer as we've been sales prepping him, he would handwalk 45 minutes up these hills and then he would go in the stall and lay down. He would sleep flat out all day long and sometimes I would have to wake him up to feed him. He just had a good attitude. There was nothing super sweet about him; he's always been a man.”

While the colt's stall now stands empty back at Sunday Morning Farm, it will soon be filled by his half-sister by Omaha Beach that was foaled in March.

“She is like the farm princess,” Polan said with a big smile. “I don't spoil them and I didn't make her that way. She was just born that way.”

Also on the farm is Wit's younger brother– this one a son of none other than City of Light.

Polan said she currently has eight mares in her broodmare band.

“I count them 40 times a day and then I forget,” she jokes, and then shares what she looks for in potential additions to her band. “It's the same thing when buying a mare as choosing what stallion to breed to: If they make my knees weak then that's the one I want. I don't get emotional about it to where I'll spend whatever it takes. With my mares I have to have a price limit and I'm just lucky that I've been able to have been so lucky.”

And luck, Polan believes, is what it all comes down to in this business.

“Everyone says they're glad to see that the small breeder can do this. Well honestly, the big breeders deserve it just as much as anybody because look at the financial responsibility that they put on the line to be who they are. I think it has more to do with luck than it has to do with hard work or intention or being out there every evening going through your fields, because we all do that. We all work hard and some of us get lucky and some of us haven't had our luck yet.”

However modest Polan's outlook on the reasoning behind these recent successes, she will keep the fond memories tucked away to ponder daily as she raises up the next crop of future runners at Sunday Morning Farm.

“I think it's what keeps us all working in the Thoroughbred business,” she said. “It's the carrot in front of the old nag, or whatever they say, and it's just amazing to think that a payoff like this can happen to anybody.”

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Keeneland September’s Third Session Sees $1.7 Million City Of Light Colt New Sale Topper

Enthusiastic bidding for Thoroughbred racing prospects continued Wednesday during the third day of the Keeneland September Yearling Sale in Lexington, Ky., when yearlings by young sires lit up the bid board with colts from the first crops of multiple Grade 1 winner City of Light and 2018 Triple Crown winner Justify fetching $1.7 million and $1.55 million, respectively. Young sires were represented by eight of the 10 highest prices of the session.

Woodford Racing, Talla Racing and West Point Thoroughbreds bought the $1.7 million City of Light colt, who is the highest-priced yearling so far in the sale. Talla Racing and West Point teamed to purchase the Justify colt for $1.55 million.

A total of 13 yearlings have sold for $1 million or more during the first three days of the September Sale.

Strong demand fueled healthy results on Wednesday, the first day of the Book 2 catalog. Keeneland recorded gross sales of $60,996,000 for 211 yearlings, for an average of $289,081 and a median of $230,000. Through the first three sessions of the September Sale, a total of 419 yearlings have sold through the ring for $151,618,000, for an average of $361,857 and a median of $290,000.

Wednesday's gross sales were up by 49.3% from the comparable session in 2020, with the average up by 30.9% and median increased by 27.8%. Buybacks declined from 34.4% on day three last year to 25.4% on Wednesday.

“That was amazing – one of the best sale days we have seen in a while,” Keeneland Vice President of Sales Tony Lacy said. “Every time you picked your head up, it was another $500,000, $600,000 yearling. There was a lot of optimism and a diverse group of buyers. We had a lot of end users and new money. It was really positive with a great vibe around the grounds. Today should lead to an exciting day tomorrow.

“We found a lot of consistency where the momentum of Book 1 flowed into Book 2 – a confluence of positive things happening all the way through,” Lacy continued. “A lot of people have not been able to buy a horse yet. There is a pent-up demand. They are not going to go home until they fill their orders.

“We call the September Sale the world's yearling sale and it really is. Everybody has been in play.”

“The highlight today was the depth of the market,” Keeneland Director of Sales Operations Cormac Breathnach said. “Apart from the two million dollar-plus horses, we had 26 others that brought over half a million and they went to a broad base of buyers, particularly domestic demand in today's case. We've seen the new money that we saw in credit applications go to work today. People are excited about what they're buying and they're excited about sticking around. It's a tremendous day.”

Rosilyn Polan's Sunday Morning Farm of Woodford County, Kentucky, consigned the $1.7 million colt, who is out of the Tapit mare Anchorage.

“I have always loved this colt,” said Polan, who bred 2021 Sanford (G3) winner and Hopeful (G1) runner-up Wit and sold him for $575,000 at last year's September Sale. “I have always known he was special, and I knew that people would like him, but usually people like a horse for a certain price. Nobody can ever dream of a million dollars.

“I am so proud of my horse and my crew,” added Polan, who consigned three horses to this year's September Sale. “The mare is my favorite mare – of course anybody would say that now. (This colt) is just a fabulous horse.”

Asked how she would celebrate the achievement, Polan said, “Clean stalls, turn out yearlings, clip ears, feed, go to bed early, get up and ship (my horses) tomorrow (to Keeneland). That's the best part of it, is that it keeps you real.”

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Bill Farish of Woodford Racing said he likes City of Light “a lot. (The yearling colt) is a stunning individual, very strong, good bone colt. A rare type individual. It was a full price, but I knew we were going to have to stretch to get him.”

The colt is the first acquisition for the Woodford, Talla, West Point partnership. On Tuesday, Woodford and West Point purchased the $1.6 million session topper, a Quality Road colt who is a half-brother to Grade 1 winner Girvin and classic-placed Midnight Bourbon.

Talla Racing and West Point Thoroughbreds acquired the $1.55 million Justify colt who is from the family of champion Wait a While. A half-sister to stakes winner Feeling Mischief, he is out of the stakes-winning Latent Heat mare True Feelings.

“We have a team together: (trainer) John Sadler, (agent) David Ingordo and West Point Thoroughbreds,” Mike Talla said. “We had had our eye on two or three of them and kept getting outbid. So finally, we had to make a stand somewhere. We really liked this one, so we went in for him. We'll know next year if we made a mistake or not. Let's talk next summer.”

The purchases were especially memorable to Terry Finley, West Point's Founder and President.

“After 30 years, I think about when I first came here, and I thought it was the best thing in the world when we bought a horse for $12,000,” Finley said. “And now, we get a shot to buy horses like this with great partners and great people. It's just incredible. We've worked hard to evolve, and we're just part of a team. We like to think we're good partners, and we bring on good partners. We all do our own thing, and it's a special thing. These horses are very hard to buy, and I just couldn't do it without an immense amount of support and people who are in a position to take chunks.

“You just start dreaming with these kind of horses, and just hope you get lucky.”

Stonehaven Steadings consigned the $1.55 million Justify colt and 10 hips later sold a $750,000 filly from the first crop of Grade 1 winner Mendelssohn out of Grade 2 winner Wasted Tears, by Najran, as agent for Bart Evans and Stonehaven Steadings.

B.B.E. purchased the $750,000 filly, whose 2-year-old half-brother, Corniche, won his Sept. 4 debut at Del Mar by 4¼ lengths. Her 4-year-old half-sister, Look Me Over, scored a 3½-length win in an allowance race at Ellis Park on July 25.

“Probably the most exciting thing I have experienced in this business,” Stonehaven Steadings Director of Bloodstock and Client Development Aidan O'Meara said about the sales. “We were high on them all along. There was a huge update for the filly. The (Justify) colt has been one of our top two colts all along, but he really blossomed in the last two months. He was a class act all the way through. He improved every day and you could feel the momentum building with the serious players getting involved.”

“(Right now) I am flabbergasted and shocked and overwhelmed about the whole thing. We certainly weren't expecting those kinds of results. We had aggressive reserves but they blew past them by 200 percent. You dream of a day like this with two quality horses back to back.”

A colt by Gun Runner from the family of champion Untapable sold for $975,000 to West Bloodstock, agent for Repole Stable and St. Elias. Consigned by Gainesway, agent, the colt is out of Untapable's full sister Time to Tap, by Tapit. The family also includes Grade 1 winner and sire Paddy O'Prado, Grade 2 winner Fun House and Grade 3 winner Majestic Eagle.

“He's by Gun Runner – probably can't name a hotter stallion or a stallion that's gotten off to a hotter start than him,” Jacob West said. “And (this colt) looks a lot like his dad. The whole team loved him.

“He was kind of the 'talking horse.' We had a pretty good idea that he was going to cost a lot of money, but that was right about what we thought he would bring. We knew we were going to have to fight off some pretty serious competition, and I'm just glad we got him.”

West said the colt would go to trainer Todd Pletcher.

Gainesway was the session's leading consignor, selling 21 horses for $7.9 million. They included three of the day's 10 highest-priced yearlings.

Gainesway, agent, sold a $900,000 filly from the first crop of Mendelssohn whose dam, the Discreet Cat mare Acrobatique is a half-sister to champion Covfefe and Japanese Group 2 winner Albiano. She sold to Solis/Litt, agent.

Another notable sale for Gainesway occurred when Maverick Racing paid $800,000 for a colt by Quality Road who is the first foal of Grade 1-placed stakes winner Cherry Lodge, by Bernardini. The colt's family includes Canadian champion Curlin's Voyage, Grade 1 winner Stormello, Grade 2 winner My Best Brother and Grade 3 winner Gala Award.

Courtlandt Farm purchased a colt by Gun Runner out of Grade 2 winner Broadway's Alibi, by Vindication for $875,000. He was consigned by Lane's End, agent.

Agent Donato Lanni signed the tickets for two high-priced horses offered consecutively in the ring.

For SF Bloodstock/Starlight/Madaket, he paid $850,000 for a colt by Curlin whose 2-year-old half-brother, My Prankster, won his career debut by 10 lengths at Saratoga on Aug. 21. Consigned by Summerfield, agent for Stonestreet Bred & Raised, the colt is out of Grade 2 winner My Wandy's Girl, by Flower Alley.

“Very well-bred horse,” Tom Ryan of SF Bloodstock said. “By Curlin, a stallion we really admire, out of a mare that looks like she has a chance to be a very good mare at this point. My Prankster looks like a good colt.

“We definitely noticed the 2-year-old winning as well as he did. We admired him at last year's yearling sale. This colt looks like a very nice two-turn colt.”

For Charles and Susan Chu's Baoma Corp., Lanni paid $825,000 for the yearling that preceded the Curlin colt, a filly by Quality Road who is the first foal of stakes winner My Miss Chiff, by Into Mischief. She was consigned by Taylor Made Sales Agency, agent for Town & Country Horse Farms.

“Beautiful,” Lanni said. “She was just a real quiet filly, really well-made, like a good runner.”

Lanni, agent for SF Bloodstock/Starlight/Madaket also paid $775,000 for a colt from the first crop of champion Good Magic consigned by Woods Edge Farm, agent; $675,000 for a son of Uncle Mo consigned by Gainesway, agent, and $440,000 for a Twirling Candy colt consigned by Clearsky Farms, agent.

By spending $2.74 million for the four yearlings, Lanni, agent for SF Bloodstock/Starlight/Madaket, was the session's leading buyer.

The fourth session of the September Sale, which marks the conclusion of the two-day Book 2, begins tomorrow at 11 a.m. ET. TVG2 will have live coverage of the session from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. The entire sale is streamed live at Keeneland.com.

The September Sale runs through Sept. 24.

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