Pappacap

3rd-Santa Anita, $65,500, Msw, 3-14, 3yo, 1 1/16m, 1:43.94, ft, 1 1/4 lengths. VOLDEMORT (c, 3, Good Magic--Beauty Buzz, by Bernardini) couldn't reel in 'TDN Rising Star' Tiz Secure (Maximum Security) in their mutual unveiling Feb. 22, but the 8-5 favorite more than got the job done here with a workman-like effort on the front end. Quickly to the front to control the pace, he came under pressure after the half in :45.78 and tried to give the field the slip entering the second bend. On a clear lead, but...

Saturday marked the final day of under-tack previews for the Ocala Breeders' Sales Company's March Sale of 2-Year-Olds in Training and a colt by Gun Runner (hip 654) set the bar within the first six hips of the day with the sales co-fastest time, breezing an eighth in a swift :9 3/5. The grey or roan colt, consigned by Eddie Woods, agent, was a $200,000 Keeneland September grad for St. Clair Stables last year. He is the first foal out of Tynan, a winning daughter of Liam's Map who is...

2nd-GP, 50K, Msw, 3yo, (S), 1mT, 1:25 p.m. Purchased for $650,000 at FTSAUG in 2023, Florida-bred OUR SOUPER HERO (War of Will) was his sire's priciest yearling from that debut crop. Owned by Live Oak Plantation, the colt, who will face fellow Florida-breds Friday, is a half to both GSW/MGISP Pappacap (Gun Runner) and GSW Boppy O (Bolt d'Oro). First dam Pappascat, herself graded stakes placed, boasts a perfect four-for-four record for runners to winners. Debuting on the turf for trainer Mark Casse, Our Souper Hero gets Dylan Davis aboard....

This is a fun category. Priced between $10,001 and $19,999, these stallions remain within reach of many hands-on breeders, yet include quite a few that can be legitimately described as proven. At the younger end of the scale, meanwhile, others remain full of promise. As already emphasized in this series, stallions that have shed their rookie glamor can offer real value to breeders of adequate nerve and imagination. If you're genuinely trying to get ahead of the curve, and not just cynically exploiting a vogue in which you have no...

And so another cycle opens, bringing all the usual dilemmas. To assist their resolution--albeit the exercise seldom fails to entail a degree of provocation, sometimes even offense--today we commence our annual quest for value among Kentucky stallions. This time round, value feels likely to prove quite elusive. With the middle market increasingly porous, stud fees overall are at a challenging level. If they were driven up by a long bull run in international bloodstock, that appears to be tapering away and there's evidently going to be quite a lag before...

After hearing from Chris McGrath in his 2024 Value Sires Part I, we thought we'd ask several breeders who they thought offered particularly good value this year. Here's what they said: Jody Huckabay The horses I have chosen are expensive, but I think they are good value. GOLD: Elite Power (Curlin--Broadway's Alibi, by Vindication), Juddmonte Farms, $50,000. The first horse I like for his body of work, race record, and pedigree is Elite Power. To me, he's on top of the list, with everything being considered. I look at it...

Walmac Farm has come a long way since owner Gary Broad purchased the historic property off Paris Pike in 2018. After several years spent resurrecting the farm and its signature blue and white barns, in 2022 Broad brought his multiple graded stakes winner Core Beliefs (Quality Road) home to be the first sire to stand in a newly renovated stallion complex. This year, Broad added Grade I winner Pinehurst (Twirling Candy) to the roster, handing the farm's new stallion salesman Jay Goodwin a challenge to get the word out on...

Grade II winner Pappacap (Gun Runner), has been retired and will stand the 2024 breeding season at Gary Broad's Walmac Farm in Lexington, KY, the farm announced on Tuesday. His fee will be $12,500, stands and nurses. In three seasons for Hall of Famer Mark Casse, Pappacap amassed a career line of 12-2-4-2 for earnings of $842,430. In addition to capturing the 2021 GII Best Pal S. at Del Mar, he was second in the GI TVG Breeders' Cup Juvenile and GI American Pharoah S. behind champion Corniche (Quality Road)....

Boppy O (Bolt d'Oro) was greeted by an ecstatic winner's circle as he circled back to the Saratoga grandstand after his 23-1 upset in the GIII With Anticipation S., but he had another cheering squad celebrating from his birthplace in Reddick, Florida. His breeders George and Karen Russell of Rustlewood Farm were out with friends as the juvenile colt made his turf debut, but they didn't hesitate to huddle around their phone at the dinner table so they could watch the race live. "We were thinking it would sure be...

'TDN Rising Star' Smile Happy (Runhappy) and Zandon (Upstart), one a graded winner in their second trip to the races and the other unlucky not to achieve the same, meet for their respective sophomore debuts in Saturday's GII Risen Star S. at the Fair Grounds. The Risen Star is the first of 16 races that comprise the 'Kentucky Derby Championship Series' and offers Kentucky Derby points on a 50-20-10-5 scale. A $185,000 purchase out of the 2020 Fasig-Tipton Selected Yearlings Showcase, Smile Happy was the recipient of an inside-out ride...

Let go at 28-1 and apparently overmatched on paper, the well-tried Call Me Midnight (Midnight Lute) stormed down the center of the long Fair Grounds stretch to just nose out narrow second choice Epicenter (Not This Time) in Saturday's GIII Lecomte S., the first of three local preps on the Road to the Kentucky Derby. A maiden winner at fifth asking going Churchill's one-turn mile last Nov. 13, the $80,000 OBS March grad raced well back in the field as Surfer Dude (Curlin) and last-out Gun Runner S. hero Epicenter...

Fastest two minutes in sport? You'll excuse us a bitter laugh here. By the time Mandaloun (Into Mischief) leaves the gate Saturday for the GIII Louisiana S., he'll be 382,968 minutes into a GI Kentucky Derby without end. And, with no sign of anyone putting their attorneys back in the holster, it's plainly going to be a while yet before we know whether Mandaloun will finally be anointed the 147th winner of a race that drives so many millions of dollars of investment in our industry. (Listen to this column...