All Equine All The Time

Northern Dancer ( WikiMedia Commons photo) On July 16, attention turns to fillies in Ireland when the 2016 Darley Irish Oaks takes place at the Curragh. Twelve fillies from seven different barns will line up to join a winner’s list that has seen names such as Ouija Board, Alexandrova, Peeping Fawn, Snow Fairy, Blue Bunting and Chicquita join it in recent years. International breeders will be paying close attention to this race as during the 2016 season, the eight sires represented in the entries stood in three different countries (Ireland, France, Germany) with no grandsire represented by more than one son. Not surprisingly, Galileo leads all sires by the number of runners with four in addition to being the grandsire of the Teofilo daughter Ajman Princess. As has been on prominent display in 2016, Galileo is turning into just as important a broodmare sire as a sire and he has two chances to pick up another classic win in that category here (Red Stars and Turret Rocks). ...

Donegal Moon The first yearling sale of the season is behind us with the Fasig-Tipton holding a two day sale on Monday and Tuesday that kicked off with a special evening session for a Horses of Racing Age sale with the yearling session the following day. After taking a day to dive into the sales results, here are a few observations from the Fasig-Tipton Kentucky July Sale. Testing the waters with Donegal Moon – Every year a handful of stallion prospects who still have some racing left to do go through the ring. But not many go through the ring in July of their 3-year-old year off a victory that makes it look like they can make a lot of noise the second half of this year. It was unknown how a type like Donegal Moon would go over in the ring but he proved that there is money out there for types like him if owners want to take it. He drew a final bid of $1.6-million, which wasn’t enough to get him sold but does open doors for this sale in the future if they want to try and recru...

An Animal Kingdom filly at Keeneland January The first major yearling sale in the United States every year, this year’s Fasig Tipton July Sale has 347 yearlings by 115 sires entered before outs. Sires with first yearlings are in the spotlight here with 32 freshmen represented but they aren’t the only stars people will be watching on July 12. Here are five sires (or group of sires in one case), both new and old, to be aware of when you flip through the catalog this week. Animal Kingdom - Of the 12 Animal Kingdom weanlings who went through the ring last year in the U.S., 11 sold with his most expensive being a $210,000 filly out of a daughter of multiple Grade 1 winner Precious Kitten and his most expensive colt being a $180,000 half-brother to Grade 1 winner Ice Box. Animal Kingdom started his stud career in Australia for the 2013 southern hemisphere season before shuttling to Darley America in 2014. His first yearlings in Australia hit the sales earlier this year with 46 of t...