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By Wandering Eyes · Posted
Byron King's Top 12 on the Road to the Kentucky Derby, presented by Spendthrift Farm.View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
The New York Racing Association, Inc. (NYRA) and Woodbine Entertainment have joined forces to create the Empire Trillium Series, a 14-race program of stakes races restricted to horses foaled in New York or Canada worth $3.2 million in total purses, the pair announced Tuesday. The Empire Trillium Series will begin at the new and reimagined Belmont Park with eight stakes to be contested between December 2026 and February 2027 on the one-mile Tapeta course. “NYRA looks forward to partnering with Woodbine Entertainment in this unique venture to create additional black type opportunities for owners and breeders on both sides of the border and to drive further interest in the inaugural winter meet at the new Belmont Park,” said Rob MacLennan, NYRA's Racing Secretary. The Empire Trillium Series will then head north to Woodbine Racetrack in Toronto, Ontario, with a further six stakes–four of which are to be contested on Tapeta and two on turf–to be held between April and July in 2027. “Woodbine is excited to partner with NYRA on this new racing series that creates opportunities for not just our racetracks, but for those that invest in the racing programs in New York and Canada,” said Tim Lawson, Vice-President of Thoroughbred Racing for Woodbine. “It's important that we be innovative and look to try new things, and we're optimistic the Empire Trillium Series will generate positive results for everyone involved.” The marquee events of the series at Belmont Park will be held in late January with the inaugural editions of the $300,000 Long Island Derby and Oaks, which will serve as the middle leg of the New York segment of the series. The remaining six races in the series at Belmont Park will all be run for foals of 2024 with purses of $200,000 each. Four of those races will comprise the inaugural Empire Trillium opening day, when a sprint and route race for each sex will be run on the last Saturday of 2026. The final two races will be sprints, one for each sex run in late February. “The Empire Trillium Series represents a meaningful step forward in strengthening regional breeding programs across borders while creating new racing opportunities for New York-breds and Canadian-breds alike,” said Najja Thompson, Executive Director of the New York Thoroughbred Breeders, Inc. (NYTB). “We commend NYRA and Woodbine for their collaborative vision, and NYTB is proud to support an initiative that showcases the quality, depth, and competitiveness of our respective programs on an international stage.” Woodbine Racetrack will then host six races for 3-year-olds and up, including four $200,000 events comprised of six-furlong sprints for both boys and girls on Tapeta during Spring 2027, followed by seven-furlong sprints on Tapeta in the same categories in July 2027. The Woodbine Racetrack-based races are headlined in June 2027 by a pair of $300,000 events, one each for older boys and girls, at one-mile on the world-famous E.P. Taylor Turf Course. The post NYRA And Woodbine Create Empire Trillium Series appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
By now, no doubt, it must be among my most wearily familiar complaints. Only last week, in fact, I was again lamenting the days when old-school trainers would start Classic campaigns round one turn, gaining sharpness and conditioning without entering a stress zone. Nowadays those benefits are forfeited by the twin imperatives of hiding horses in their stalls, even as they need GI Kentucky Derby points. Those points being unavailable in sprints, the defining test of the American Thoroughbred has duly been shorn of raw speed. Other traditionalists presumably shared my satisfaction, then, on seeing an outstanding modern trainer apparently dusting off the strategy of past masters to set up the GII Rebel Stakes success of Class President (Uncle Mo) with a spin over seven furlongs in the Swale Stakes. In the event, it turned out that connections had been reluctantly forced into that corner by the weather. But necessity is the mother of invention, and maybe people will observe the palpable benefits to this colt. The last horse to win the Derby off this kind of launchpad was Nyquist, who beat another subsequent Classic winner in Exaggerator in the GII San Vicente Stakes. Nyquist, of course, headed Uncle Mo's debut crop and similarly got him started as sire-of-sires. And, as sire of GIII Gotham Stakes winner Iron Honor, Nyquist made Uncle Mo's legacy the central motif of last weekend's Derby trials. Uncle Mo | Sarah Andrew That legacy was tragically curtailed by Uncle Mo's death, at 16, in December 2024. Without a posthumous Class President or two, however, it might be argued that his profile was flattening out somewhat. However premature his loss, the fact is that Uncle Mo covered huge books year after year. With 1,630 named foals, he left a bigger footprint than Curlin, still going strong at 22 but so far responsible for 1,426; or Speightstown, who covered his final book at 25 and left 1,524. Now I have no idea what substance there may be, if any, in the theory that sheer mare volume can erode a stallion's genetic prowess. As ever, any black-and-white “rule” feels wrong: Into Mischief, with his phenomenal libido and fertility, is certainly showing no sign of tapering off. But it cannot be denied that Uncle Mo's performance in 2025, with sophomores conceived at a career high $175,000, was tepid: he dropped to 18th in the general sires' table, with 10 stakes winners at 3.3 percent of starters, and a solitary Grade I performer. But any stallion can have a thin year. And the bottom line remains that overall Uncle Mo, with all his volume, has maintained a rock-solid 9.4 percent stakes winners-to-starters. Besides, as always, we must also honor the contribution of his partners! Class President was bred by WinStar out of Top Quality (Quality Road). (Ah, Quality Road…20-year-old sire of 1,147 named foals!) A triple black-type winner, albeit round Emerald Downs and Hastings, she was purchased on retirement for $335,000 and has been given every chance with her covers. She started with resident prove-your-mare option More Than Ready (their son was stakes-placed before losing his way) and was then given consecutive dates with Into Mischief. One resulted in a colt who won his only start, a juvenile sprint; the other produced a filly, retained at $725,000 as a yearling, who also showed ability in a light career, last seen finishing second in a sprint stakes at Prairie Meadows last May. Class President duly takes a promising mare to a new level, and the farm must be delighted to have daughters by Justify and Nyquist lined up. WinStar being WinStar, Top Quality had more to recommend her than merely racetrack competence. She was a way into a wonderful Kinsman Farm family under her granddam Undeniably, who was by In Reality out of GI Hollywood Oaks winner Past Forgetting (Messenger of Song). Though purchased for just $31,000 after a middling track career, Undeniably produced five graded stakes performers, including millionaire Concerto and GI Florida Derby runner-up Wondertross (both by Chief's Crown); and Illusioned (Woodbine), who broke the Churchill 7.5f track record in the GIII Ack Ack Handicap. Another was Sweet Fervor (Seeking the Gold), a Grade II winner over seven furlongs at Gulfstream. Sweet Fervor has attested to the efficacy of Quality Road with this blood as granddam of Strong Quality, who remains in training at seven with stakes wins to his name on both turf and dirt. Sweet Fervor's unraced daughter by Bernardini, Lemon Bay, also clicked with Quality Road: their son won a seven-furlong stakes round Belmont, while their daughter is now dam of Class President. Though sown by serial Classic brands (and outstanding broodmare sires) in Bernardini, Seeking the Gold and In Reality, there's plenty of single-turn dash in this family. Yes, Class President rallied to repel his Oaklawn challenger, and his people are keen to stretch him out. But if they are correct that the Swale didn't play to his genetic strengths, then maybe that test was precisely what sharpened him sufficiently to press the pace and get first run next time out. Iron Honor | Sarah Andrew Striking While The Iron Is Hot Another recurring theme: if people really believed in all these new stallions, the time to double down would be exactly when everyone else moves on. That's what Mike Freeny and his late wife Pat did with Uncle Mo, sending him a mare from Dunquin Farm when cut to $27,500 in his third season. The result was Dream Tree, foaled the year Nyquist emerged as champion juvenile and winner of her first five starts including the GI Starlet Stakes. Dunquin did something similar with Nyquist himself, sending him Orencia (Blame) when his fee was throttled back to $55,000 in 2022, down from $75,000 after the 2020 champion freshman mustered a single graded stakes winner in 2021. They were duly able to sell the resulting colt as a short yearling for $230,000 to Scoot Stables at the 2024 Keeneland January Sale. Unfortunately they also sent his dam into the ring, and she went for just $20,000. (A coup for Machmer Hall, agent for Glen Eden.) Both proved very sharp buys. The colt was pinhooked for $475,000 back in the same ring that September. And now that we know him as the aforementioned Gotham winner, Iron Honor, the mare could soon become hot property. Orencia won a couple of times–a Churchill maiden claimer, then a turf allowance at Gulfstream–in seven starts in the Freenys' silks. They had bred her from Curry Cat (Tale of the Cat), an unraced daughter of the useful grass performer Pratella (Jade Hunter), whose three stakes wins were crowned in the GIII Cardinal Handicap. Pratella was a four-generation Hickory Farm project, a granddaughter of its important mare Terpsichorist (Nijinsky), herself daughter of the imported European Classic winner Glad Rags II (Ire) (High Hat {GB}). Terpsichorist, full-sister to the charismatic British juvenile Gorytus, won the GII Sheepshead Bay Handicap and became granddam of Lane's End stallion Union Rags, and third dam of globetrotter Declaration of War. By the way, Iron Honor combines two principal legacies of that gloriously wholesome influence, Arch–responsible both for damsire Blame and for the mare who produced grandsire Uncle Mo. The Only Blame Worth Pursuing Which takes us to yet another familiar topic! Because if Iron Honor reiterates Blame's stature as a remarkably precocious broodmare sire, then GIII Honeybee Stakes winner Explora confirms how he continues to sire very classy runners in his own right. Explora was bought in utero with her dam, Collections Choice (Bernardini), for $75,000 at the 2022 Keeneland November Sale. She brought just $22,000 as a Keeneland September yearling, before soaring to $350,000 at Timonium last May. Meanwhile, between those transactions, her dam was discarded back at Keeneland for $24,000 to Korea. But these things will always happen with horses, and the only Blame anyone needs to pursue is the stallion. Though Collections Choice won only a Belterra turf maiden, she's out of Model (Giant's Causeway), who was placed in three Grade Is (on synthetic). Admittedly Model's five other named foals contributed nothing to the page: all were male, stood little racing, and showed little when they had the chance. But we can certainly forgive the next dam Snowfire (GB) (Machiavellian) for failing to match her racetrack quality as a producer. A granddaughter of the GI Kentucky Oaks winner White Star Line (Northern Dancer), she was beaten a neck in a British Classic but her breeding career was cut cruelly short and Model was her only daughter. Whatever happens now, Explora looks a priceless broodmare prospect: a multiple graded stakes winner by Blame out of a Bernardini mare! Their respective records, as distaff influences, were refreshed over the weekend by the further success of Magnitude (Not This Time) and Knightsbridge (Nyquist), both out of daughters of Bernardini; and then by graded stakes success at Gulfstream for Just Basking (Arrogate). Just like Explora, she was acquired in utero with a Blame mare. The post Breeding Digest: Class Renews Sire’s Posthumous Momentum appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
Racing Club has announced the launch of its new Owners App, developed in partnership with The Racing Manager. “Our goal has always been to make racehorse ownership as exciting, transparent and accessible as possible,” said Richard Jaques, director and co-founder of Racing Club. “By partnering with The Racing Manager, we're delivering a modern digital experience that keeps our members closer to the action than ever before. Owners can now access everything they need from trainer updates to detailed performance analysis all within one seamless platform.” Andy Ash, founder of The Racing Manager, added, “This development reflects our ambition to support large-scale organisations that want to develop their own software systems but have yet to appreciate the existing available technology. The Racing Manager is the leader in this field and was built to streamline communication and administration into one digital hub. “We can now leverage our core offering to deliver bespoke solutions through a fully integrated platform that supports efficient internal and external communication.” Founded in 2023, Racing Club is a UK-based syndicate offering ownership opportunities from £25, with over 30 horses currently in training with the likes of Andrew Balding, Richard Hannon, Jamie Snowden and Roger Varian. For more information, visit the Racing Club website. The post Racing Club and The Racing Manager Partner in New App for Owners appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
Goffs has released the catalogue for the Doncaster Breeze-Up Sale, which has been a source of 11 Royal Ascot winners throughout the past decade. This year's sale will take place on Tuesday 21 April and Wednesday 22 April and features a typically strong book with stallions like Mehmas, No Nay Never, Starman, Havana Grey, Lope De Vega, Night Of Thunder and Too Darn Hot all represented. Goffs UK Managing Director Tim Kent said, “A strike rate of 110% for Royal Ascot wins in the last 10 years is a phenomenal statistic for any catalogue, let alone one that sells only around 200 horses a year. It's that unrivalled performance that has driven this sale to new heights, setting records across the board last year, headlined by the £1,000,000 top price. “The Doncaster Breeze-Up's seat at the top table has been hard earned and feedback from our inspectors is that our vendors have delivered a catalogue that builds on those successes. Following last year's superb results, demand for places in the sale has been incredibly strong and due to the high standard of nominations, we have seen the number catalogued increase on last year to 233 two-year-olds, which is also just two less than was catalogued in 2024.” He added, “We have already begun canvassing buyers, having travelled throughout the Middle East and had a very good response. We will continue our visits throughout the UK and Europe in the coming weeks, and we look forward to welcoming an international audience to Doncaster in April.” The Goffs Breeze Up Sale at Doncaster will see the two-year-olds breeze on Doncaster racecourse on Tuesday 21 April from 8.30am with the sale to be held the following day on Wednesday 22 April from 10am. For more information on the sale, please contact the Goffs UK team on +44 (0)1450 372222. The post Goffs Point To ‘Incredibly Strong Demand For Places’ At Doncaster Breeze-Up Sale appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article
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