WinStar Farm

'TDN Rising Star' Life Is Good (Into Mischief), backed like he couldn't lose the GI Woodward S. at Belmont at the Big A, was briefly challenged by longshot Law Professor (Constitution) before ultimately shutting the door on that foe and splashing home a 1 1/4-length winner Saturday. The winner's stablemate Keepmeinmind (Laoban) was third in the four-horse affair. Perfect in three prior Stateside starts this season, with a lone blemish a fourth in the G1 Dubai World Cup in March, the China Horse Club and WinStar Farm representative was a...

Jody and Michelle Huckabay's Elm Tree Farm consigned a son of Curlin on behalf of Barbara Banke's Stonestreet Bred & Raised that topped Saturday's fifth session of the Keeneland September Sale in Lexington on a bid of $900,000. Just 48 hours later, the couple sold a colt by leading sire Candy Ride (Arg) for $600,000 to repeat the dose during yet another solid day of trade Monday which saw the sale surpass its turnover from last year with fully five days of selling remaining. Monday's topper was one of 10...

Ben Hanley will join WinStar Farm as the newest member of its stallion season sales team, officials at the farm announced Thursday. Having earned a degree in equine science from the University of Kentucky and a degree from the Irish National Stud course, Hanley joins WinStar after stints with Hall of Fame trainer Bill Mott in Saratoga and after working in yearling prep for WinStar, Coolmore and Taylor Made. Hanley has also worked in customer-facing roles with Taylor Made at Keeneland and Fasig-Tipton Sales. After his graduation from the INS...

Sponsored by Alex Nichols Agency 2nd-KD, $150k, Msw, 2yo, 6 1/2fT, post time: 1:58 p.m. ET WinStar and Gainesway Farm's SUNDANCE (Quality Road), an $800,000 Keeneland September yearling, moves to the lawn for his second outing. The Rodolphe Brisset trainee was a well-beaten fifth in his main-track debut at Ellis Park Aug. 6. The juvenile is the first foal out of Grade I-placed Cherry Lodge (Bernardini). Richard and Connie Snyder's Tollgate Canyon (Arrogate) makes his first trip to the post for trainer Joe Sharp. Out of graded-placed Burg Berg (Johannesburg),...

Sponsored by Alex Nichols Agency 2nd-Ellis Park, $60k, Msw, 2yo, 6f, 2:18 p.m. ET WinStar Farm and CMNWLTH's PENSACOLA (Into Mischief) opens his career for trainer Rodolphe Brisset. The bay colt was acquired for $600,000 following a :10 1/5 work at the Fasig-Tipton Midlantic May sale earlier this year. He is a son of stakes winner Stormy Regatta (Midshipman) and a half to stakes winner Bay Storm (Kantharos). Also debuting is AMO Racing's Hurricane J (Nyquist), a $330,000 KEESEP yearling trained by Paulo Lobo. He is a half to Grade...

More Than Ready (Southern Halo--Woodman's Girl, by Woodman), whose 216 worldwide stakes winners is the fourth highest total of all time, was euthanized the morning of Aug. 26 at WinStar Farm due to the cumulative effects of old age. He was 25 years old. "More Than Ready was an amazing horse who touched everyone he came in contact with," said Elliott Walden, president, CEO, and racing manager of WinStar Farm. "He may not have been the biggest horse in the barn, but he more than made up for it in...

It's not a too common occurrence for sales-topping purchases to make it on the track despite the world of promise their pedigree, physical, and connections might imply. Further out still is the extraordinary feat of reproducing themselves or--at the very least--producing several runners of equitable talent between them, though stallions have the task on significantly easier asking than do the fillies and mares. Mendelssohn is patiently inching closer to changing that outlook and his Del Mar winner from last Saturday proves the stallion can get a promising runner at any...

The National Awards Dinner will be held Saturday, Sept. 10, 2022, at Keeneland, and the National Awards Luncheon which honors breeders from 18 states and Canada will be held on Friday, Sept. 9 at Ashford Stud. While the state and Canadian breeder awards, as well as some of the national awards, are predetermined--three awards will be announced live at the dinner on Saturday evening. The three awards that will be announced live are: The National Owner of the Year presented by 1/ST, National Breeder of the Year, and Small Breeder...

SARATOGA SPRINGS, NY - Fasig-Tipton will be looking to continue the momentum set by its record-setting select sale when bidding returns to the Humphrey S. Finney Pavilion Sunday evening for the first of two sessions of the New York-Bred Yearlings Sale. Bidding begins Sunday at 7 p.m. and Monday's session will begin at 12 p.m. With the end of the sweltering conditions which punctuated the last week in upstate New York, activity was high at the sales barns on a picture-perfect Saturday morning as a mixture of end-users, pinhookers and...

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. Check out the first few editions of our series here. WinStar Farm's Liam O'Rourke vividly recalls the day that breeders got their...

by Christie DeBernardis & Jessica Martini LEXINGTON, KY - The Fasig-Tipton July Selected Horses of All Ages Sale, marking its 10th edition, confirmed its importance on the calendar with a strong renewal at Newtown Paddocks Monday. "It was a tremendous sale tonight," said Fasig-Tipton President Boyd Browning, Jr. "It was even stronger than we anticipated. We saw an unbelievable depth of bidding activity tonight. We had activity from the East Coast, West Coast, international participation. It was very encouraging. It was a very strong marketplace overall." A total of 129...

Actuator (Bodemeister), just a $2,200 FTKFEB yearling graduate, stayed perfect on dirt to capture a career high in Saturday's GIII Indiana Derby. Third in his first two tries on grass for trainer Rodolphe Brisset at Horseshoe Indianapolis last term, including going a mile in his juvenile finale Oct. 6, he returned from the bench to air in his dirt debut going seven furlongs in his first try for trainer Michael McCarthy at Churchill Downs last time June 8. With Black Type Thoroughbreds acquiring a 75-percent controlling interest since, 3-1 third-choice...