Sunday, July 13, 2008

Pinhooker's Guide to OBS Fall Yearlings


The OBS Fall Yearling sale is the venue chosen by many pinhookers seeking prospects which they hope to prepare for sale in the following year's 2-Year-Old In Training sales. They naturally give much of their attention to the get of stallions who have demonstrated the ability to get precocious runners, those which can win early, or at least, those which can turn in a fast work at the under tack shows.

With this in mind, let's have a look at some offerings from the Selected section of the upcoming sale. We will restrict our choices to yearlings by sires who appear at the top of the Juvenile Sire statistics lists. For this purpose, I selected the following stallions from BRISNET's Juvenile Sires lists, both the list by SPI (Sire Production Index) and the list by Earnings.

City Zip - 2nd by SPI, 6th by Earnings
Exchange Rate - 3rd, 2nd
Graeme Hall - 20th, 13th
Hennessy - 4th, 26th
Lion Heart - 5th, 1st
Macho Uno - 18th, 14th (Leading Juvenile Sires of FL Breds by Earnings)

Dixie Union, who is among the leading Juvenile sires, is not represented in the sale, nor is another from the Earnings list - Swiss Yodeler. Freud, another Juvy leader, has only one in the general section.

Recent sales performance by these stallions give an indication of why I chose them.

A colt by Macho Uno brought a winning bid of $250,000, to top the opening session of the Ocala Breeders' Sales Company's Spring Sale of Two-Year-Olds in Training. The youngster worked one furlong in :10 1/5 at the under tack show. He was purchased for $19,000 as a yearling at the 2007 Keeneland September sale. That represents an ROI of over 1300% for consigner Woodside Ranch, agent.

The February OBS Selected sale saw Pride, a filly by Lion Heart, knock down for $475,000 to Demi O'Byrne. She later won in her first start, at Keeneland on April 25th.

A top seller in the OBS June sale was a gray Exchange Rate filly, out of Infinity, which sold for $170,000 to Ramsey Farm in Kentucky.

Honey Graeme, a filly by Graeme Hall out of Dance Delight by Colonial Affair, was purchased for $260,000 by Ike & Dawn Thrash during day 2 of the OBS March Sale. The filly is a half-sister to multiple stakes placed winner Malandrina by Honor Glide. Honey Graeme was consigned by Southern Cypress Stable. She was bred by Helen Marie Napolitano.

At the Fasig-Tipton Calder selected 2-year-olds in training sale on February 26., a Lion Heart colt out of the Deputy Minister mare V V S Flawless, sold for $750,000, the seventh-highest price among colts at the sale.

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Here's a list of the hip numbers of yearlings which I think offer an above average opportunity for profit.
Click on the hip# to view their catalog page (in PDF format).

56 Exchange Rate colt
109 Graeme Hall colt
167 Exchange Rate colt
174 Macho Uno colt
179 filly by Lion Heart
193 Hennessy colt
206 filly by City Zip
221 Graeme Hall colt
226 Exchange Rate colt

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