Fasig-Tipton photo
By Sarah Mace
Fasig-Tipton’s annual preferred New York-bred yearling sale in Saratoga, the New York breeding program’s premier auction, has grown by leaps and bounds since 2011, toppling records each succeeding year and setting new benchmarks.
Each year it has been natural to wonder whether the auction has reached its ceiling. As the 2018 results show, the answer is, “Not yet.” By the time trading wound down at Sunday’s second and concluding session, another set of records had fallen by the wayside.
This year’s New York-bred yearling sale saw a record-setting top-seller bring $600,000 and posted a new record average price of $107,512. This marks the the first time in the sale’s history the average has topped six figures. The average was also 20.7% higher than the 2017 average of $89,088.
The median price, too, closed in record territory at $76,000, up 9.3% from $69,500 in 2017. Total sales were a record $18,492,000 for 172 yearlings (including six private sales to date) up from $16,214,000 last year for 182 individuals. In all, 30 horses sold for $200,000 and up, and seven went for $300,000 or more.
Fasig-Tipton President Boyd Browning, Jr raved, “The last half of the session tonight was just electric. Obviously, that’s reflective of how the horses happened to fall in the catalogue, but we had a run of horses that were just one beauty after another beauty after another beauty that sold remarkably well.”
Browning also observed that he has seen an expansion of the customer base in the New York-bred yearling market. “I think you saw tremendous diversity among the buyers tonight. There were certainly some new names on the results who haven’t been active previously in the New York-bred marketplace. I think that’s a direct result of the quality and the success New York-breds are achieving all over the world.”
The single qualifier for the sale’s across-the-board success was an increased buyback percentage. At the end of the first session, RNAs came in at a very high 41.2%. The figure moderated to 34.6% after Tuesday’s session with a total of 91 horses going unsold. Last year the RNA rate at the sale was 25.4%. As Browning pointed out after the first night of trading, the large numbers of RNAs may be a function of the lucrative racing options open to owners and breeders if they do not get what they consider to be a fair price at auction.
Jonathan Thorne (Fisig-Tipton photo)
The record-setting sale topper was Hip 588, a bay colt by Pioneerof the Nile bred by Jonathan Thorne’s Thorndale Farm in Millbrook and hammered down for $600,000 to John Ed Anthony’s Shortleaf Stable.
Thorndale Farm purchased the colt’s dam Score for $120,000 at the 2016 Keeneland November sale in foal. An unplaced daughter of A.P. Indy, Score has already produced three winners, including one graded stakes performer and one stakes performer. The colt’s second dam is multiple Grade 1 winner and million-dollar earner Educated Risk, who is also a multiple stakes producer.
Thorne said, “The [record-setting colt] is an incredible horse. He’s been a beautiful horse since he was born, and he’s just gotten better and better. He’s a very intelligent and honest horse. I’m proud of my horse and I’m proud of my team at the farm to get him to this point. It’s special. I think he’s got a great future, so I can’t wait to watch him.”
“[The achievement of setting this record] feels great,” added Thorne. “All of us around here have been doing this for a while and everyone has stepped up their game as the quality of the New York-bred crops continues to rise every year. We are all trying to up our game and keep producing high-quality horses. This is a great sale and it continues to get better and better every year. I don’t see that stopping.”
Thorne resold Score in February for $45,000. “She did not get in foal last year, so I thought it might be an ok idea to sell her in Fasig February,” Thorne explained. “Some good friends bought her from me, Alex Solis and Jason Litt, so they have the mare and they bred her back to Classic Empire. She is a lovely mare and a pretty good buy, so I hope for the best for them as well.”
Fasig-Tipton photo
Following a pair of yearlings who brought prices in the $300,000s Saturday, three more met that threshold on Sunday, led by Hip 573, an Into Mischief filly out of talented New York-bred race mare Risky Rachel (Limehouse).
The bay March 17 filly, who went to Jeff Drown’s Kindred Stables, LLC for $350,000 as the top filly of the session, is a third-generation product of Sanford Bacon’s breeding program and issues from his most successful family.
The filly’s third dam Lolli Lucka Lolli was a multiple winner campaigned by Bacon’s Bacon Barn. After retiring to the breeding shed, the mare was twice honored as New York Champion Broodmare (1997, 2001) for producing two legendary Empire State breds. Her 1992 foal Dancin Renee was voted the 1997 New York-bred Horse of the Year, Champion Sprinter and Champion Older Female. Two years later Lolli Lucka Lolli produced eventual $2-million earner and sire and Say Florida Sandy, voted New York-bred Champion Sprinter and Horse of the Year in 2000 and 2001.
Sanford Bacon (Fasig-Tipton photo)
Risky Rachel, the winner of six stakes races for Bacon is out of the champion Dancin Renee. Her first foal, a juvenile by Scat Daddy, now named Yale, sold for $1,000,000 to Todd Pletcher for Coolmore Stud’s M. V. Magnier at the Fasig-Tipton Gulfstream sale this spring.
Hip 604, a bay colt by Into Mischief bred by Mrs. Joanne Nielsen and consigned by Francis & Barbara Vanlangendonck’s Summerfield went to Michael Neatherlin for $320,000. His dam Silken Lily is an unraced half-sister to multiple graded stakes winner, millionaire and sire Upstart. Earlier in the week at the Fasig-Tipton select yearling sale Silken Lily’s yearling half-brother by American Pharoah brought $1,000,000.
Hip 590, a dark bay/brown colt by the late City Zip was purchased by Randy Bradshaw, Agent for $300,000 from the Indian Creek consignment. Bred by James Lamonica, Lee Sacks & Soave Stables, the youngster is out of Nick’s Honor, an unraced Jump Start mare who has produced four winners including New York-bred stakes winners The Lewis Dinner (Posse) and Kelli Got Frosty (Frost Giant).
“I liked everything about him,” Bradshaw said. “He’s a June foal, but he has plenty of size. He’s by City Zip and the mare has done nothing wrong. She’s a very good mare. We are just hoping down the road we can make a little money with him. We’ll probably put him in the April sale at OBS and see if we cando well with him.”
Lamonica said, “We love the New York program and we had the farm up here, Empire Stud, for a long time. This mare started out as a product of that. We bought that mare with a partnership as a 2-year-old in training and she was very talented. She’s a huge mare, she’s 17.1h. She fractured a hip before her first start, so we just bred her to the house stallions. And then she kept having stakes horses, so we decided to go to Tale of the Cat and City Zip. Actually, it’s a little sentimental because this yearling was the last City Zip ever born. City Zip was very good to me over the years. So, this was important.”
