Quality Road Ascends Ladder at November Sales

When we combine The November Sale, Fasig-Tipton's breeding stock sale in Lexington, with Books 1 and 2 from the Keeneland November Breeding Stock Sale (Nov. 5-8), there were 1,320 horses cataloged in the first four days of the Kentucky November mixed sales.

A total of 762 horses were listed as sold (57.7% of those cataloged), for a combined gross of $207,318,000, an average of $272,070. Last year the comparable sessions had 1,318 catalogued and 751 sold (57.0%), for a total of $222,454,500 and an average of $296,211. So the gross dropped by 7%, and the average by 8%, from the comparable sessions last year. 

However, it is probably not correct to conclude the market is down. Whereas when thousands of yearlings are sold the pedigree component of the selling population is roughly equivalent from year to year, this is not necessarily the case with mixed sales, where the composition of the catalogs can vary significantly from year to year.

Fasig-Tipton cataloged 221 horses this year, 12% fewer than the 250 cataloged in 2018, and sold 128, 9% fewer than the 140 sold at the 2018 sale. The sale grossed $68,011,000, which was 24% less than the $89,473,000 generated in 2018, and the average dipped by 17%, from $639,093 last year to $531,336 this year. But the sale still averaged $531,336, which is hardly in some basement, and the 2018 sale had itself seen a 20% jump from 2017, when it grossed $74 million.

It was more that 2018 was a record year than reflecting some real dip in the market. There wasn't.

Meanwhile, Keeneland's first three days (Books 1 and 2) were actually up by $6 million (+5%), from just under $133 million in 2018 to $139,307,000, while Keeneland's Book 1-2 average edged up by 1%, from $217,645 to $219,727.

These first four days marked the ascension of Lane's End's Quality Road  into the top rung of commercial sires. Of sires with four or more weanlings sold in the first four days, Quality Road averaged $404,167 for six foals sold, ranking him second only to Curlin , who had four weanlings average $493,750. Three other sires averaged over $400,000, but with three or fewer sold: War Front  (1/$650,000); Tapit  (2/$475,000); and Medaglia D'Oro  (3/$450,000).

Five other sires had four or more weanlings average $280,000+ during November's first four days of selling: Uncle Mo  (4/$368,750); first-crop weanling sires Gun Runner  (8/$344,375) and Arrogate  (4/$311,250); Into Mischief  (14/$291,071); and Pioneerof The Nile (9/$280,000). Besides Three Chimneys' Gun Runner and Juddmonte's Arrogate, three other first-crop weanling sires averaged $150,000+: Claiborne's Mastery  (10/$181,000), and the Ashford duo of Classic Empire  (11/$168,636, like the same farm's American Pharoah  a son of Pioneerof The Nile out of a Storm Cat-line mare) and Practical Joke  (10/$153,200).

Quality Road led all sires by covering sire average, with seven mares in foal to him averaging an impressive $1,175,000, and was one of five sires with seven or more in-foal mares sold who averaged over $700,000. Medaglia D'Oro had eight mares in foal average $977,500; Curlin had seven average $894,286; and, in an impressive show of commercial strength, 21 mares in foal to 2018 Triple Crown winner Justify  averaged $789,048. War Front rounded out the $700k+ group, with eight mares averaging $738,125. Tapit had four mares in foal average $613,750, and current 2019 Leading Sire Into Mischief had 16 in-foal mares average $478,438. Lane's End's Liam's Map , the only freshman sire with two G1 winners in his first crop, had just two mares sell during the first four days, averaging $830,000. 

Besides Justify, five other sires which covered their first crops in 2019 averaged over $100,000 with six or mares sold in-foal: Lane's End's City of Light  (21/$250,714) was definitely popular, but good commercial performances were also recorded by Spendthrift's Bolt D'Oro  (11/$185,909); Hill 'n' Dale's Good Magic  (13/$150,000); Ashford's Mendelssohn  (10/$141,500); and Lane's End's Accelerate  (6/$121,167). Airdrie's Collected  had just one in-foal mare catalogued in the first four days, and she brought $220,000.

Even though the averages for many of these will fall as they have more representation in the 'back books,' it's instructive to see how they sold during the 'premier' first four days, comprising The November Sale plus Keeneland's November Books 1 and 2.