Brendan Gallagher

They pride themselves on their professionalism and were duly mortified when a yearling colt by Tapizar somehow ended up with a nail in a hoof. Worse still, shortly afterwards his full sister--sold at Keeneland the previous September for $100,000--made a winning debut at Horseshoe Indianapolis. The mare was coming good. So Brendan and Oliver Gallagher sent him in to Hagyard, to have the foot cleaned and disinfected. Back then, in 2017, they didn't know Michael Spirito as well as they do now ("a god of a surgeon"); but nor did...

It had been a bit of a tough run for Skyfall Thoroughbreds' Geoffrey Von Honste, truth be told, and he was thinking that it was time to call it quits. Covid had been hard on business, there were a couple of bad breaks with the horses, and things just didn't seem to be working out for him in the Thoroughbred game. But they say that life is what happens when you're making other plans, and on Thursday, the thing that happened was that he became a Royal Ascot-winning breeder when...

The Fasig-Tipton Winter Mixed Sale, ideally positioned just ahead of next week's start of the breeding season, opens for its two-day run Monday morning at Newtown Paddocks. Hips one through 324, a collection of racing and breeding prospects and short yearlings, will be offered Monday and will be followed Tuesday by hips 325 through 673. Bidding begins each day at 10 a.m. "I've always really liked this sale because of its timing," said consignor Zach Madden, whose Buckland Sales brings a 13-horse consignment into the auction. "There is a little...