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Cupid Colt on Top as Book 5 Concludes

A colt from the first crop of Grade I winner Cupid (Hip 3391) topped Wednesday’s trade when selling for $200,000 to bloodstock agent Larry Zap, who was acting on behalf of Michael Mellen.

The topper and the day’s third-highest purchase, a son of fellow first-season sire American Freedom (Hip 3196), were both sold by Shawhan Place, who was the session’s leading consignor by average.

“Both of them are big, strong colts, especially the Cupid,” said Shawhan’s Matt Koch. “He is a good walking colt. We foaled and raised him at the farm. We know everything about it. That is kind of our niche, to bring up horses we are very familiar with, and the market rewarded us today”

Bred by Jory Sherman and Don Blowe, the Cupid colt is out of the Distorted Humor mare Just Joking, who is also responsible for GSP Quick Release (Trappe Shot). His third dam is champion Safely Kept (Horatius).

Zap could not be reached by phone, but tweeted a photo of the colt with the following caption: “Headed to Jesse Hoppel in Ocala to get his education! A special thanks to Amanda Murphy for helping out with isolating the colt. What a cool colt with a great mind and the physicality to match. Feeling so fortunate to have Mike Mellen believe in what we do!”

Hoppel will be heading back to Ocala with both of Wednesday’s top lots, having purchased the second highest-priced offering, a $115,000 colt by first-crop sire Klimt (Hip 3523). Consigned by Vinery Sales, the colt was bred in New York by Allen Hallett and is a half-brother to Grade I winner El Deal (Munnings).

“He is a May 29th foal,” Hoppel said. “There is no telling what he is going to be as a 2-year-old. He is a horse that is going to take a little more time. He will probably a candidate that ends up at a later [2-year-old] sale if we go that route. How handy he is and how well put together and balanced, there is no telling what this horse could be when he grows up.”

A total of 290 yearlings changed hands Wednesday for a gross of $4,521,900, an average of $19,920 and median of $13,000. There were 63 horses that failed to meet their reserves. Overall, through 10 days of selling, 2,129 youngsters sold for $245,278,700. The average was $115,208 and the median was $50,000 with 795 RNAs.

“There is not quite the stock that was in here in the earlier books,” said “So individuals like the [top two colts] are standing out amongst the rest. I am glad some of the guys who have a little more money than we do are already gone.”

From the buyer’s perspective, Koch found the market to be tough.

“It is tough,” Koch said. “We had five horses in today. Two of them did extremely well, but with the other three it is tough sledding. When you’ve got that horse, it’s great. They exceed your expectations. But, when you don’t have that horse it is tough times.”

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Kevin Attard Joins TDN Writers’ Room

You’d be hard-pressed to find a more successful claim in the past decade than Blue Heaven Farm’s Starship Jubilee (Indy Wind). Plucked for $16,000 from Jorge Navarro of all people in February of 2017 at Gulfstream, the now 7-year-old mare has taken trainer Kevin Attard on the ride of a lifetime, and scored her greatest triumph yet with a victory in Saturday’s GI Woodbine Mile S., becoming a multimillionaire in the process. Wednesday, Attard joined the TDN Writers’ Room podcast presented by Keeneland as the Green Group Guest of the Week to tell he and Starship Jubilee’s rags-to-riches story.

“We were just looking for horses to bring back to Woodbine at the time,” Attard recalled of he and dad Tino Attard’s thought process back in 2017. “At Gulfstream, it’s really tough to claim, you’re always kind of shaking for horses that look legit on paper and have good form to them. So we had gotten out-shook a lot of times with a couple of claims we had put in. She had come across on form like she had some potential, had run some decent enough races, seemed like she was appreciating stretching out a bit. So we took a chance and we were lucky enough to win the shake that day. And the rest is history.”

Now with 19 wins in 38 starts and hardly any duds in her past performances, it’s clear that Starship Jubilee has something special about her. Attard tried to pinpoint what it is that makes the mare so consistent.

“She’s just a very competitive horse,” he said. “Even in the morning, she’s not an easy filly to train in the sense that when she wants to go, you have to have a good exercise rider on her. And Ricardo Pilgrim, who’s been galloping her, has done a great job with her here at Woodbine. So we’ve been fortunate with that. She’s very feisty, has a lot of sass and attitude about her, and is not a typical mare that you can just hug or cuddle up to. She’s got some fire and if you’re not on your toes, she’ll bite you. She could kick you. She’s really a handful when she wants to be, and I think that translates onto the racetrack. She just brings that attitude with her to the track. Whether it’s competing against the fillies and mares or the boys, she’s just ready to lay it down and give her best.”

Elsewhere on the show, the writers reacted to the development of the first guilty pleas stemming from March’s FBI indictments and debated the wisdom of restrictive new whip rules. Then, in the West Point Thoroughbreds news segment, they discussed Tiz the Law (Constitution) skipping the GI Preakness S. to train up to the GI Longines Breeders’ Cup Classic. Click here to watch the podcast; click here for the audio-only version.

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Santa Anita Release Revised Autumn Stakes Schedule

With its original start date delayed due to air quality concerns related to the Bobcat Fire, Santa Anita Park announced a revised Autumn Meet Stakes Schedule, which kicks off Sept. 25 and offering a total of 12 stakes–11 graded–and seven of them Breeders’ Cup “Win & You’re In” Challenge Race qualifiers. Santa Anita’s complete Autumn Meet Stakes Schedule is available at www.santaanita.com/stakes-schedule/.

Among Saturday’s races are the GI Awesome Again S., GI Rodeo Drive S., GI American Pharoah S. and the GII Chandelier S. and the Speakeasy S., all of which will provide the winners of each race a fees-paid berth into their respective Breeders’ Cup races at Keeneland Nov. 6 and 7. The following afternoon, two additional ‘Win and You’re In’ Challenge races will be offered–the GII Zenyatta S. and GII Santa Anita Sprint Championship.

For more information, visit www.santaanita.com.

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Max Player to Preakness

George Hall and SportsBLX Thoroughbreds Corp.’s Max Player (Honor Code) will contest the Oct. 3 GI Preakness S. at Pimlico.

“I’m very excited because I haven’t been in the Preakness yet,” said Hall, who won the 2011 Belmont with 24-1 shot Ruler On Ice. “After the Kentucky Derby, he looked like he wanted to keep running. Steve watched him closely, and he was in great shape. He’s galloped well. He’s breezed well. We felt the horse was at the peak of his game and is ready to run.”

Winner of the GIII Withers S. for Linda Rice in February, Max Player finished third in the June 20 GI Belmont S before filling the same position in the GI Travers S. Aug. 8. Transferred to Steve Asmussen, he was fifth in his latest start in the Sept. 5 GI Kentucky Derby. Asmussen previously won the Preakness with Curlin (Smart Strike) in 2007 and again in 2009 with the filly Rachel Alexandra (Medaglia d’Oro).

“I really feel like we will be competitive,” said Hall. “If you look at the Belmont S., where we were third, he didn’t have such a great trip. We got really caught behind a lot of horses and had to move around a lot and still wound up being third because he came on so strong at the end. In the Travers, he again came on strong to be third. It’s no shame to lose to Tiz the Law, as everybody knows. We feel like he’s a really good horse. When we started to look at the Preakness, I think the view is that he’s in perfectly good health. He’s in good shape, and he needs to develop. Reviewing the Kentucky Derby, he really came out of the gate slow [from post 1] and was far behind in the first jump. If we can get a little better trip out of the gate, maybe get a better post position and not fall so far behind and give him so much work to do at the end, we think that we can be competitive.”

According to Hall, jockey Paco Lopez will partner the colt for the first time in the Preakness.

“Obviously, we want to stay in the race, but we have to be careful because he is going to be a closer, no matter what,” said Hall. “I’m sure Steve will give Paco the correct instructions.”

Looking farther down the road, Hall added, “He had a long layoff before the Belmont, but then he’s had a robust campaign since,” Hall said. “What’s most important to us is that he stays healthy and has a good 4-year-old and, hopefully, 5-year-old career. We didn’t really think there was negative toward running in the Preakness that would affect his long-term prospects as a 4-year-old. We’re pretty excited about what he’s going to do be doing in the future, too.”

Hall bred Max Player through his K & G Stables, named for his children Katherine and George, with the colt raised on his Annestes Farm in Versailles, Ky. Hall owns 86% of Max Player, with SportBLX Thoroughbreds owning the other 14%. Co-founded by Hall and Joe De Perio, SportBLX Thoroughbreds offers micro-shares in racehorses. More micro-shares in Max Player, which will come out of his majority interest, likely will be available for purchase next week, Hall said.

Asmussen will also run Monmouth Park’s Pegasus S. winner Pneumatic (Uncle Mo) in the Preakness. Joe Bravo will have the mount.

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