Keeneland April Sale Returns Tuesday

LEXINGTON, KY – The Keeneland April 2-Year-Olds in Training Sale returns from a four-year hiatus Tuesday in Lexington with bidding beginning at 2 p.m. and a select offering of 40 juveniles took to the Lexington oval on a drizzly Monday for the auction's under-tack preview.

“Mother nature didn't do us any favors with the rain, but the track looks like it is very fair and very safe and allows these horses to demonstrate the kind of exceptional talent many of them have,” Keeneland's vice president of racing and sales Bob Elliston said. “I've been very pleased and I'm tickled at the clients that are here looking at horses. All of the right kinds of buyers in the 2-year-old market are here and we just need a few of them to get on the same horses tomorrow.”

A trio of juveniles shared the fastest furlong of the preview, each covering the distance in :10 flat, while a filly by Competitive Edge earned the quarter-mile bullet of :21 1/5.

A colt by Bodemeister (hip 136) was the first horse of the breeze show Monday morning and promptly set the furlong standard of :10 flat. Consigned by Wavertree Stables, the bay colt is out of stakes placed Resident Alien (Bertrando), a full-sister to Grade I placed Shaggy Mane. The youngster was a $60,000 Keeneland September purchase.

“He's been a fast horse all year,” said Wavertree's Ciaran Dunne. “He's done everything right all year. We expected a big work from him and he delivered.”

Wavertree was represented by another bullet worker when hip 126, a colt from the first crop of multiple Grade I winner Liam's Map, worked in :10 flat during the day's second set. A $190,000 Keeneland September yearling, the gray colt is out of graded stakes winner Jenny's So Great (Greatness).

Dunne pinpointed Liam's Map as his first-season sire to watch earlier in the year and admitted Monday, “This colt is one of the reasons why. He is a beautiful horse. We put him a little later [in the day] just to get everybody's nerves calmed down and he showed up like we thought he would. He's a nice horse.”

Wavertree sent out 10 juveniles to work Monday.

“Everybody kind of breezed right in relation to everybody else right where we thought they'd be,” said Dunne.

Of the soggy conditions, Dunne added, “We can make excuses for some of them, but for the most part they got through it and handled it. It was the same for everybody.”

A filly by Tapit (hip 130) also shared the :10 flat bullet. Consigned by Hartley/De Renzo Thoroughbreds, the bay filly is out of Grade I winner My Conquestadory (Artie Schiller) and is a full-sister to GII Fountain of Youth S. runner-up Bourbon War. She was a $775,000 Keeneland November weanling purchase.

Hip 130 was one of three juveniles from Hartley/De Renzo to work Monday. The consignment also sent out a pair of fillies by Triple Crown winner American Pharoah: hip 142 worked in :10 1/5 and hip 155 matched that :10 1/5 time.

Kip Elser's Kirkwood Stables sent out Monday's fastest quarter-mile breezer when Le Competition (Competitive Edge) worked in :21 1/5. The dark bay filly is out of the unraced Lefreakcestchic (Bellamy Road), a half-sister to multiple stakes placed He's So Chic (Jump Start) and from the family of graded stakes winners Living Vicariously, With Distinction and Sightseeing.

“We had as good and as safe a track as we could possibly have under the conditions,” said Elser, who sent out eight horses to work Monday. “They did a great job with the track. The horses went well and everybody came home well. I think some of them were more confident going over the mud than others, but those are today's conditions.”

Of Le Competition, Elser said, “She is one that really relished a wet track. I was in the chute, I didn't see her frontside, but I know she galloped out past me tremendously.”

Tuesday's renewal will be the first time Keeneland has held an April sale since 2014. The last April Sale produced champions Lady Eli and Roy H. and graduates of the boutique auction include six Classic winners.

“A lot of people would like to have additional opportunities to showcase their horses,” Elliston said of the sale's reemergence. “And we are very pleased with the quality of the horses that are here and the buyers that are here. I hope we can build on it.”

With the absence of the now-defunct Barretts Spring Sale, the Keeneland auction is even more important to major consignors like Wavertree.

“From our perspective, it's just replaced Barretts,” Dunne said of the Keeneland April sale. “We have quite a few to sell, so we need venues so we're not competing against ourselves. This has always been a good spot to sell horses, horses have sold well and horses have done well off of here. So hopefully it works and we have a better turnout next year.”

Elser agreed the 2019 renewal of the April sale will be one to grow on for all parties.

“It's hard to get something back on the calendar,” Elser said. “I think next year will be a really, really good sale. This year, we'll have a good sale. But it needs to be used as a confidence builder on both sides, or maybe three if you count Keeneland themselves.”

The Keeneland April sale will open with an offering of 94 catalogued horses of racing age.

“I'm ecstatic about the horses of racing age part of the sale,” Elliston said. “I think they will be very much in demand because there is a lot of great racing getting ready to start around the country, at the rest of our meet, at the Churchill meet, and in New York. There are going to be tons of opportunities to run these horses back and get a return on your investment pretty quickly because they are already made horses and of high quality.”

Elite Sales will offer a 14-head consignment of horses of racing age, including graded stakes placed Sweet Diane (Will Take Charge) (hip 90). Elite's Brad Weisbord agreed the timing of the April sale is perfect.

“There are a couple of times a year that these racehorses are selling,” Weisbord said. “January and November are generally when the season has been done. So April is the first sale where the season has started and the horses have current form. We only had July as an option–which obviously we'll be selling at as well–but you have to wait six or seven months to get in and you're right on top of the summer in that sale. So you're now right getting started in the spring and then rolling into the summer. So by summertime, you'll be in full gear with your new trainer.”

Sweet Diane was third in the GII Fair Grounds Oaks and currently sits 19th on the points board for the GI Kentucky Oaks.

“After [divisional leader] Bellafina, I think you can throw a parachute over the next group of fillies,” Weisbord said. “I think they are all running in that 75-84 Beyer range. Sweet Diane has speed figures to compete with those horses. She has Kentucky Oaks points–she's on the border right now, but there are races like the GII Black-Eyed Susan on Preakness weekend and the GIII Delaware Oaks. It's extremely hard to buy dirt, long 3-year-old fillies, in form, good looking and she is a gorgeous physical.”

At the crossover from horses of racing age and 2-year-olds in training, a pair of juveniles who already have race form were late supplements to the April sale. Mean Sophia (Smarty Jones), who broke her maiden by 10 1/2 lengths at Keeneland on opening day last Thursday, will sell as hip 95. Competitive Queen (Competitive Edge), second in a maiden special weight at Keeneland Sunday will be offered as hip 96. Both fillies are owned by Savannah Goebel and trained by Cirilo Gorostieta.

Of the pair's late entry into the sale, Elliston said, “I was in the winner's circle [Thursday] and I went straight up and I introduced myself to Cirilo. I said, 'That was very impressive. You know we have a sale next Tuesday.' He said, 'Everything is for sale.' Kyle Wilson and Mark Maronde are running this sale and they got him right in. And then he put another one in–the horse that ran second yesterday. So he has a couple in there and we're excited for him and hope he does well.”