Honor A.P.

Value Sires For 2024, Part 3: The $10k Club

Somehow this is a real sweet spot in the market. For a stallion farm, the $10,000 cover is a particular pitch: you're a cent away from offering a horse at four figures, but you feel that dropping him into a low-rent neighborhood might be beneath his dignity. You're offering a very accessible fee, but you're not going to let him look cheap. That makes this a surprisingly congested zone, ample for separate assessment. And since clinging to a five-figure fee somewhat represents a show of faith, some of these sires...

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Son Of Maximus Mischief Conquers Maiden Field At Del Mar

8th-Del Mar, $84,000, Msw, 7-23, 2yo, 5f, :57.71, ft, 2 1/4 lengths. RAGING TORRENT (c, 2, Maximus Mischief--Violent Wave, by Violence) received an unconvincing 9-1 chance in this maiden spot after bringing $75,000 at the OBS April Sale and was a step slow behind the field to start. In chase mode from the bell, he saved ground into the turn and fanned out wide to bid with a quarter to run. Despite Antonio Fresu losing his crop at the head of the lane, Raging Torrent needed no extra encouragement, drawing...

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Value Sires, Part 3: First Yearlings in '23

The stallions we assess today find themselves at the first major crossroads of their new career. Poor fellows, they're still a long way from having the chance to demonstrate whether they can actually produce runners. But that seems a pretty incidental consideration in the current marketplace, which has created a self-fulfilling cycle. Like it or not, stallions nowadays do indeed have their best chance of producing a good one from their first crop, as these typically emerge from the biggest and best books they will ever get. That, in turn,...

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First Foal Arrives for Honor A. P.

Grade I winner Honor A. P. (Honor Code)'s first foal arrived Jan. 27, 2022 at Coteau Grove Farms in Sunset, Louisiana. The filly, bred by Coteau Grove Farms, is out of multiple black-type winner and graded stakes performer Joanie's Catch (First Tour). "The resemblance of this filly to her sire is uncanny, right down to her four white socks," said Andrew Cary, Coteau Grove Farms' bloodstock advisor. "There is no doubt about who her sire is. Honor A. P. was right up there with the best of his generation and...

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Value Sires, Part II: First Foals in '22

Even last year, when doing so much to fortify breeders through the uncertainties of the pandemic, stallion farms appeared to price their rookies to squeeze the usual juice from the commercial market's greatest addiction. That was fair enough. Nowadays farm accountants can bank only on the most fleeting of vogues in drawing up a business plan for stallion acquisitions. And nor can we sensibly expect any slack now, pending the arrival of first foals and then a debut at the weanling sales next fall. A stallion has to be in...

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Max Shows Honor Still Cracking the Code

When a horse carries a name like this, there can be no evasion or equivocation. With due honesty, then, let us admit that Honor Code is not yet converting his transparent eligibility as a stallion--apparently so watertight in pedigree, physique and performance--in quite the fashion that seemed likely when he produced the luminous Honor A.P. from his very first crop. Not yet. Small, agonizingly flexible words, in the context of a suffocatingly impatient marketplace. By any rational measure, it should still feel like early days in Honor Code's stud career....

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First Mare in Foal to Honor A. P.

Grade I winner Honor A. P. (Honor Code--Hollywood Story, by A.P. Indy) has his first mare confirmed in foal, Lane's End announced Tuesday. The first mare scanned in foal is stakes winner and graded stakes-placed Omaticaya (Ire) (Bernstein), owned by Dell Ridge Farm, LLC. She is from the female family of Grade I winner Muhtarram (Alleged), champion St. Hilarion (Sir Ivor), and graded stakes winners Ballet de France (Northern Dancer) and Profit Column (Private Account). An $850,000 Fasig-Tipton Saratoga yearling purchase, Honor A. P. broke his maiden as a 2-year-old...

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Fulfilling the Candy Ride Legacy at Lane's End

Lane's End Farm brought their stallion roster up to 21 members this year as they welcomed several new additions for the 2021 season in Game Winner (Candy Ride {Arg}), Gift Box (Twirling Candy), Honor A. P. (Honor Code) and Daredevil (More Than Ready). We sat down with Bill Farish and spoke with him on Game Winner and Gift Box, both Grade I-winning millionaires who will join Twirling Candy and Unified in carrying on the Candy Ride (Arg) legacy at Lane's End. Now a perennial leading general sire, Candy Ride began...

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Bill Farish Joins the TDN Writers' Room

Lane's End's Bill Farish joins this week's TDN Writers' Room and explains why he's bullish on the future of horse racing.

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Lane's End Goes Virtual for Annual Press Pass

The Lane's End Press Pass event has become increasingly popular over the past few years, and while hosting a large gathering in their stud barn was made impossible for the farm due to the current circumstances, Lane's End still worked to make the third annual Press Pass a reality. Through a Zoom meeting, media members joined the virtual get-together to chat with Bill Farish and the rest of the Lane's End team about the farm's stallion program. TVG racing analyst Scott Hazelton hosted the event and led participants through the...

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Value Sires for 2021, Part II: New KY Sires

For the first half of this story, please visit yesterday's instalment. Precocity may not be the first thing you'd have in mind from Tom's d'Etat (Smart Strike--Julia Tuttle, by Giant's Causeway), who enters service at WinStar at $17,500 after only really seizing our attention at the age of seven. Nonetheless, he represents one of the most promising prospects of the intake. For a start, he's by a sire of sires out of a graded stakes-placed Giant's Causeway mare whose own dam was a full-sister to Candy Ride (Arg). And nine...

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2021 Fees for Lane's End; Quality Road Down to $150,000

On the heels of the announcement Friday that top three leading second-crop sire Daredevil will return to the U.S. from Turkey to stand at Lane's End Farm, the Versailles nursery and stallion station released its full roster and stud fees for 2021. A total of 21 stallions will make up the roster, led again by stalwart Quality Road, who gets a fee cut from $200,000 to $150,000. A majority of key breeding sheds are cutting 2021 stud fees due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Candy Ride (Arg) will also see his...

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