Firespike, Quality Rocks Top OBS Stakes
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Stakes winners Firespike and Quality Rocks top the respective male and filly divisions of the OBS Championship Stakes at Ocala Breeders' Sales Co. Jan. 27.
The OBS races consist of the two $100,000-guaranteed Championship Stakes, each at 1 1/16 miles, and two $50,000-guaranteed sprint stakes at six furlongs. They are restricted to 3-year-olds who went through an OBS auction. The races precede the Jan. 28-29 OBS winter mixed sale.
Trained by Mike Maker for Skychai Racing, Kevin Charles Warner, and Silver Dollar Stable, Firespike tops seven entered in the Championship colt and gelding division with $123,259 in earnings gleaned from two wins and two placings in six starts.
The Flower Alley colt, has mostly raced on turf and will be making his first start on a synthetic surface after winning the Juvenile Turf Stakes at Gulfstream Park West and then finishing sixth, three lengths behind winner Chief Kitten, in the Pulpit Stakes to complete his juvenile campaign. In his previous dirt outing, Firespike finished seventh in the Claiborne Breeders' Futurity (gr. I) at Keeneland.
Maker purchased Firespike for $70,000 from the Blue River Bloodstock consignment to the 2014 OBS April sale of 2-year-olds in training.
Quality Rocks, winner of the 2014 Arlington-Washington Lassie Stakes, tops the 13-horse field for the filly division. The Bill Mott-trained daughter of Rock Hard Ten, off the board in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf (gr. IT) at Santa Anita Park Oct. 31, is also entered in the Sweetest Chant Stakes (gr. IIIIT) Jan. 24 at Gulfstream Park.
Consigned by Woodford Thoroughbreds to the 2013 OBS August yearling sale, Quality Rocks did not attain her reserve price and was bought back for $37,000.
The colt and gelding OBS Sprint Stakes is a family affair for the Rice family, as the Clyde Rice-owned Less Than Perfect, trained by the owner's grandson Kevin Rice, will be ridden by Clyde Rice's granddaughter Taylor Rice. The son of Pleasantly Perfect won the 2014 Fitz Dixon Jr. Memorial Juvenile Stakes at Presque Isle Downs and had two wins from 10 starts with earnings of $125,305 in 2014.
Clyde Rice purchased Less Than Perfect for $22,000 from the TdM Sales consignment to the 2013 OBS August sale.
R Sassy Lass, winner of the Sandpiper Stakes at Tampa Bay Downs for trainer Kirk Ziade, tops the filly sprint division. The Exclusive Quality filly was purchased by Richard Averill for $40,000 from the Journeyman Bloodstock Services consignment to the 2014 OBS April sale of 2-year-olds in training.