TED TALKS... Good times to be had in the US

I HAVE SPENT TIME in Lexington this year looking after Stonereath Farm for Imad Al Sagar and it has opened my eyes to the vibrancy of the US thoroughbred industry.

When sitting down to chat with the many expat residents, as well as the Kentucky hardboots, they all praise the state incentive breeding programmes.

The Kentucky breeding programme provides almost $40,000,000 prize-money at Kentucky Downs, a racetrack that suits European-skilled jockeys to navigate its undulations twists and turns.

My good friend, ex-colleague Dr Scott Pierce, has invested in the New York programme, foaling down mares on Rood and Riddle’s farm in New York State to gain eligibility and to keep the cheques rolling in once a week.

The programmes only work in numbers, giving you critical mass.

At Fasig-Tipton I bumped into Alex Cole, one of the only Brits at the Fasig-Tipton July Sale and he had flown in especially.

He has already plundered the Kentucky Downs KY-bred prize-money for his owner Jim Hay, and is always on the lookout for the Kentucky-bred racehorse.

Fasig-Tipton in July has changed considerably from when I sold yearlings on the other side of town at the last Keeneland July Sale.

The sale company has created a Horses in Training Sale to rival the Tattersalls horses-in-training sales, which has dominated in this area.

The times are shifting and the American sales companies and online sales are becoming a threat to the British sale that has been so dominant.

Tattersalls did send over representatives to remind the buying bench that the world’s leading horses-in-training sale

The Fasig-Tipton sale ground in July, and, inset, Informed Patriot who was bought by HRH Prince Saud bin Salman for $1,055,000 is still at Newmarket before they had to jet back to look after international clients at home through July week.

Early this year I saw a joint inward trade mission from America, working hard in Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Qatar and Bahrain – both American sales companies had sent heavy representation to entertain, sponsor and meet the Middle Eastern buyers.

This resulted in two of the main agents in Saudi Arabia locking horns for the Fasig-Tipton wild card entry Informed Patriot, who had run third in the Grade 3 Indiana Derby two days previously.

Informed Patriot was entered by Taylor Made on Sunday morning with full videos and testing completed ahead of selling late Monday evening.

The heavyweights from Saudi Arabia – HRH Prince Faisal bin Khalid of Najd Stud and HRH Prince Saud bin Salman – locked horns, the latter emerging victorious at $1,055,000.

We did dip the Blue Diamond toe in the water and entered our Justify colt Wonderful Justice, who had been trained by Brad Cox to win a small Turf stakes race.

We shipped in after the July 4 celebrations and the one-horse consignment had some great viewings over the weekend which resulted in numerous vettings.

It was our first foray in selling ourselves and chosen carefully against entering the market place at a yearling sale – we currently use a consignor for the US yearlings.

Erin Dilger and Jenn Laidlaw managed proceedings resulting in Blue Diamond Stud selling to Three Diamond Racing with Ibraham Rashid lurking as the underbidder.

THE COLT will be trained by Mike Maker, who has a reputation of getting the best out of second-hand horses and he should go on to make someone a fun horse.

I had a quick few days in Lexington on the farm checking our own stock and those of our client’s.

We’ve done some quarantine for ourselves and had some amazing clients join the quarantine back to Europe.

Imad Al Sagar, though, doesn’t want many boarders and the head count is set to stay around 50 in order to maintain the excellent pasture on the 250 acres that were nurtured by Darryl and Lindy Brown and Peter Bergler in the decades before us.

It’s an expensive place to run at the level Imad encourages us to aim for.

The farm also has 100 head of cattle for R W Hicks whose wife Judy bred and races in partnership the Kentucky Oaks winner Thorpedo Anna.

The farm took a leaf out of the Denali Stud book and applied for a solar panel grant, which has just been approved for one of the barns.

With the 95 degrees heat I hope we can run the barn virtually free with a surplus being purchased by the grid.

July is also a great time to see the US-based stallions after their busy season. A relaxing first stop was Ashford to see Uncle Mo, Justify and Practical Joke all stallions we used at Blue Diamond.

My personal favourite is Uncle Mo – he is a solid citizen who continues to push out the graded stakes winners.

Justify looked no worse for wear after seeing 245 mares, 145 of those from the home team. We have three mares residing at Stonereath in-foal to him.

Together with Practical Joke both horses started trading nominations much lower at the start of the season, but Justify changed all that on Breeders’ Cup Day and went up to $300,000. It is something the Americans understand, but the Europeans needed time to absorb realising they had missed the boat on the early-season opening stud fee.

The ability to increase stud fees and re-open the book at an increased stud fee is fair game in the US; if you snooze you loose and to make these stallions costs a lot of money.

I was not able to see Quality Road, who had a severe bout of cellulitis, but I will catch up with him in September.

We went to Three Chimneys to see Gun Runner, who is, a neat horse, well balanced, and would suit a lot of mares.

Although his first stakes winner was on Turf, he hasn’t had much opportunity to prove himself on the surface but I was told that Coolmore sent him 40 mares last year so you must be encouraged he will have some emerge over time.

Good Magic and Not This Time are the other emerging sires who we got to see although Good Magic is more Dirt-orientated.

The current biggest progression in the US is the online sales.

Interestingly, I used the Tattersalls monthly online sale for an unraced three-year old colt and we got 5,500gns from a good trainer in Newmarket.

Nawara Stud sold a winning colt at the physical July sale for 7,000gns which I found remarkable considering the date of the former – I’ve always said the more you let people look at these horses the more they go off them!

Not This Time