horse breeding

'TDN Rising Star' Nadal (Blame--Ascending Angel, by Pulpit), whose four wins from as many trips to the races included the faster of two divisions of the GI Arkansas Derby, will enter stud in 2021 at Shadai Stallion Station in Japan, the organization confirmed in a release Wednesday upon the 3-year-old's arrival in the country. Bred in Kentucky by Sierra Farm, Nadal was purchased by Randy Bradshaw, agent, for $65,000 at the 2018 Keeneland September sale and was successfully resold for $700,000 at last year's Fasig-Tipton Gulfstream Sale after breezing an...

None of us, after 2020, will ever again take even our simplest indulgences for granted. How much more culpable, then, was any complacency the industry may have permitted itself, over the years, in the patronage of the greatest investor in its history? His absence from the September Sale, a year after once again heading the buyers' table at $16 million, sharpened a sense of the incalculable collective debt owed to Sheikh Mohammed. His team did resurface, to much relief locally, for Book 1 of the October Sale at Tattersalls last...

Into Mischief (Harlan's Holiday--Leslie's Lady, by Tricky Creek), the reigning leading general sire whose son Authentic became his first Classic winner in the GI Kentucky Derby last month, will command a fee of $225,000 for the 2021 breeding season, officials at Spendthrift Farm have announced. The sire of 26 stakes winners and 11 graded winners in 2020, the 15-year-old stood for $175,000 this past year. Only War Front ($250,000) currently stands for a larger advertised fee. Also the sire of the brilliant dual Grade I-winning 'TDN Rising Star' Gamine, Into...

A Clearsky Farm-bred and -consigned daughter of leading sire Into Mischief out of the stakes-placed Mary Rita (Distorted Humor) was hammered down for $1.025 million to Don Adam's Courtlandt Farm to become the first to breach the seven-furlong threshold during the second Book 1 session of the Keeneland September Yearling Sale in Lexington. The Cleary family gave $230,000 for Mary Rita in foal to The Factor at the 2016 Keeneland November sale and her first live foal, a full brother to hip 275, fetched $375,000 as a short yearling at...

by Brian DiDonato, Jessica Martini & Christie DeBernardis LEXINGTON, KY--A Tapit filly out of GISW Embellish the Lace (Super Saver) topped the opening session of Keeneland's September yearling sale on a $1.25-million bid by Claiborne Farm's Bernie Sams. The bay was consigned to the auction as hip 149 by Bluewater Sales LLC, Agent XVI, on behalf of breeder China Horse Club. While stringent COVID-19 protocols put in place to allow the world's largest yearling sale to be held at all may have dulled some of the electricity typically felt in...

Instagrand (Into Mischief--Assets of War, by Lawyer Ron), a 'TDN Rising Star' and blowout winner of the GII Best Pal S. in 2018, has been retired to Taylor Made Stallions for the 2021 breeding season. He will stand for a fee of $7,500. Instagrand earned his 'Rising Star' after graduating by 10 lengths at first asking at Los Alamitos, covering five furlongs in a swift :56 flat, before validating that performance with a 10 1/4-length romp in the Best Pal. At three, he finished third off a seven-month absence in...

Edited Press Release The Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association has announced the re-election of Brant Laue as Chairman of its Board of Trustees. Joining Laue on the Board of Trustees is Shannon Bishop Arvin, Jeffrey Bloom, Marette Farrell, Dr. J. David Richardson and Stephen Screnci. Re-elected to three-year terms were current trustees Robert Devlin, Terry Finley, Brant Laue, Bernard McCormack, Charlie O'Connor and Garrett O'Rourke. "I am honored to serve another term as chair with this board of trustees," Laue said. "Our great sport has overcome many obstacles and difficulties...

Wooderson (Awesome Again--Lotta Kim, by Roar), a half-brother to Horse of the Year Rachel Alexandra (Medaglia d'Oro), will enter stud at Burdette Thoroughbred Farm in Arkansas in 2021. The deal was brokered by Chad Schumer of Schumer Bloodstock. Bred by Dede McGehee's Heaven Trees Farm, Wooderson was a $400,000 purchase out of the 2016 Keeneland September Sale, the co-highest priced yearling for his sire in 2016. Trained by Todd Pletcher for Let's Go Stable, the bay was a three-time winner from 10 starts, including a runner-up effort to future MGISW...

Really, nobody can demand respect. It has to be commanded. This business has plenty of people who shout their achievements from the rooftops of social media. They have done their own reckoning, and that doesn't necessarily incline the rest of us to reinforce their self-esteem. How much more impressive, surely, is the understated, week-by-week accretion of laurels by a man like Doug Cauthen. He is always reluctant to "claim" credit for a particular horse, knowing that the fulfilment of its potential is always divided between so many different hands. Even...

Maybe he was just born too beautiful, and too rich, to be setting the alarm every single morning and riding the same suburban train to work. He can leave the maximisation of income, the humdrum consistency, to lesser creatures. Like some aristocratic dilettante touched by genius, however, Bernardini (A.P. Indy) remains ever capable of producing a masterpiece. The Darley stallion had lately become so slack--only two graded stakes winners in each of the past two years--that this spring he suffered his third consecutive cut, to just $40,000, having commanded a...

by Jessica Martini & Christie DeBernardis The Ocala Breeders' Sales Company's Spring Sale of 2-Year-Olds in Training, an auction most people seemed happy could even be held following all of the uncertainties of the global pandemic, concluded its four-day run in Central Florida with a pair of seven-figure transactions book-ending the session. Early in the day, Kaleem Shah purchased a son of Quality Road for $1.25 million from the Wavertree Stables consignment and, with only a handful of lots left to offer, Larry Best secured a colt by Speighster for...

Commissioner (A.P. Indy--Flaming Heart, by Touch Gold), the sire of 22 winners from his first crop including the Grade III-winning Island Commish, has been acquired by HRH Prince Saud bin Salman bin Abdulaziz al Saud for his new farm in Saudi Arabia. The deal was brokered by Andrew Cary of Cary Bloodstock in Lexington. Bred and raced by WinStar Farm and trained by Todd Pletcher, Commissioner-a member of the final crop for his legendary sire-was beaten four lengths into second by Tonalist (Tapit) in the 2014 GII Peter Pan S....