Honey Creek Farms

The precautionary quarantine of Barn 44 at Belmont Park for Equine Herpesvirus-1 remains in place after a follow-up test has come back positive on one horse that had originally tested positive for EHV-1 last week. The affected horse, an unnamed, unraced 3-year-old male, had first tested positive for EHV-1 Tuesday, Jan. 9, after being sent to the Cornell Ruffian Equine Hospital near Belmont to be treated for a fever and mild respiratory issue. Since his release from the Ruffian Center, the horse has been quarantined in isolation at Belmont.

Throughout this process, the horse, trained by Linda Rice, has shown no neurological symptoms of the virus. All horses in Barn 44 have been and will continue to be monitored daily for fever and other signs of illness. Currently, all horses that had been exposed to the affected horse remain afebrile and asymptomatic. Congruent to the procedures presently in place, these horses will not be permitted to run or enter races through the duration of the quarantine. They will continue to train in isolation during special training hours following the normal closure of the Belmont training track.

Lane’s End introduced two of its new stallions, Connect (Curlin) and Unified (Candy Ride {Arg}), to a press-only function at the Versailles nursery Wednesday. The former represents a new partnership between Lane’s End and Three Chimneys Farm, which took an ownership interest in the Grade I winner.

“We bought into him when he was still on the race track, and being a Grade I-winning son of Curlin, and being as good looking as he is, we’re excited to have him,” said Lane’s End’s Bill Farish. Curlin previously stood at Lane’s End.

Connect is one of two sons of Curlin entering stud in Kentucky in 2018–Keen Ice is the other–and embarks upon his new career with smart credentials. Owned by Paul Pompa, Jr. and trained by Chad Brown, Connect won six of eight starts, including a breakout score in the GI Cigar Mile H. in 2016. He has been installed at an initial fee of $20,000, and Farish said that price point has resonated with breeders.

Doug Cauthen said Three Chimneys had pursued Connect as a stallion prospect, and came in as a partner after Lane’s End landed him.

“I loved the horse, and [Three Chimneys owner] Goncalo [Torrealba] takes a very collaborative view, whether it’s on breeding, racing or standing stallions,” said Cauthen, vice chairman at Three Chimneys. “I’ve been following Connect for a long time. Even back when Eddie Woods had him down in Ocala, he always touted the horse.”

It’s the first time Three Chimneys has joined with another farm in a stallion venture. Asked if that’s a trend he expects to become more common, Cauthen said, “There’s a joy to standing a horse [by yourself], but there are also other times where you don’t worry about that and just get involved.”

To which Farish cracked, “We’d be happy to get in on Gun Runner.”

Cauthen said that Three Chimneys took a sizable number of shares in Connect, and had tabbed several high-quality mares for him.

It could be argued that Connect’s most impressive win came not in the Cigar Mile, but in the 2016 GII Pennsylvania Derby, when he defeated a field that included Gun Runner (Candy Ride {Arg}), Nyquist (Uncle Mo), Exaggerator (Curlin) and Cupid (Tapit).

“They changed it to a Grade I the next year, but it was a Grade I [in quality],” said Cauthen. “He beat some pretty nice horses in there, and then went on and got the Grade I [in the Cigar Mile]. So in my mind he’s a multiple Grade I winner in terms of talent.”

Lane’s End’s David Ingordo and bloodstock agent Marette Farrell joined Farish and Cauthen for a panel discussion after a parade of the farm’s stallion roster. Ingordo noted that Connect’s female line is entirely free of Northern Dancer and Mr. Prospector, opening the 5-year-old to a wide array of potential mates.

“Unless she’s by Curlin or Smart Strike, almost any mare you have will work,” Ingordo said.

Unified is Lane’s End’s other new gun. Owned by Centennial Farms and trained by Jimmy Jerkens, Unified was tabbed a ‘TDN Rising Star‘ on debut, and added the GIII Bay Shore S. and GII Peter Pan S. in successive starts. Unified kicked off 2017 with a win over Mind Your Biscuits (Posse) in the GIII Gulfstream Park Sprint S. and was just touched off a neck in the GI Carter H.

“He’s another horse we bought into at the racetrack, and he started off his career brilliantly with three wins,” said Farish.

Farish was plenty familiar with the colt. Unified was raised at Lane’s End on behalf of breeder Blue Devil Racing Stable, and, from the Lane’s End Sales draft, commanded $325,000 as a Fasig-Tipton Saratoga yearling in 2014.

“As a yearling, he was one of the best-looking horses we had on the entire farm,” said Ingordo. “From my standpoint, good-looking begets good-looking. I’m expecting him to throw an athletic and commercial yearling that we hope translates into some runners.”

Unified joins Gun Runner and Mastery as Candy Ride (Arg) sons heading to stud in Kentucky in 2018, and at $10,000, is the lowest priced of the trio. (Pro-tem Horse of the Year Gun Runner will stand for $70,000; the undefeated Mastery goes to Claiborne at $25,000.)

“He just got beat in a Grade I, and there’s no question he’s a Grade I talent,” said Farish. “We would have loved for him to get a couple of those, but it didn’t work out that way, so we started him out at a lower stud fee.”

Lane’s End has a reputation for pricing its stallions fairly, and Farish said initial breeder response has been favorable.

“[Setting fees] is something we do by committee here,” he said. “Especially for a first-year horse, you’re trying to figure out what the market will bear, and you want to set a fee that hopefully you can maintain for the first three or four years. Sometimes you get it right, and sometimes you don’t. With these two, it seems we’ve gotten it right..at least for this year.”

A new executive budget bill introduced by New York state governor Andrew Cuomo Jan. 16 included proposed legislation that would allow the New York Racing Association (NYRA) to conduct night racing at Belmont up to three nights a week. The proposed legislation, which would need legislative approval before the budget is signed into law by the governor before Apr. 30, specifies that the track could race at night Thursday through Saturday, provided that the cards conclude by 10:30 p.m. ET.

While current law only allows racing to be conducted between sunrise and sunset, the New York Senate passed a bill in June 2017 that would allow NYRA to conduct night racing twice a week during Belmont’s spring/summer and fall meets. The bill was not yet voted on by the state Assembly, and any additional legislative activity was deferred to the 2018 session.

Belmont Park was recently chosen as the site for a new arena for the NHL’s New York Islanders that will be situated adjacent to the racetrack.

“We envision night racing as a part of a comprehensive redevelopment of Belmont Park,” said Patrick McKenna, Director of Communications at NYRA. “The Islanders are making preparations to begin construction on a world-class arena that will be part of a sports and entertainment complex to rival any in the country.”

While night racing is unlikely to become a reality in 2018, McKenna said the ultimate goal is to be ready when the time comes.

“This is an important moment, and it certainly marks the progress and momentum behind efforts to allow Thoroughbred racing at night,” McKenna said.

The language of the bill specified that NYRA would be required to coordinate post-times with Yonkers Raceway’s harness racing programs to facilitate an integrated schedule of racing.

In a December TDN Q&A, NYRA CEO Chris Kay said that night racing was an integral component of the development of Belmont Park into a modern day entertainment venue. The advent of nighttime racing, according to Kay, would dovetail perfectly with Islanders’ arrival to the site.

“We would like to see night racing at Belmont, primarily because the sport of horse racing needs to generate new generations of fans, like millennials,” Kay told the TDN‘s T.D. Thornton. “And those folks are working on a Thursday or a Friday afternoon. They like to go out and have a good time; we want to provide them with that opportunity. We want to offer our sport the way baseball offers their sport, at night when people can go.”

The Barretts January Mixed Sale, which this year will include a stallion season auction to benefit the victims of the San Luis Rey Downs fire, will be held Wednesday at the Hinds Pavilion at Fairplex in Pomona, California. With breeding stock, 2-year-olds, horses of racing age and yearlings on offer, bidding is scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. PT.
In the wake of the Dec. 7 wildfire that claimed the lives of 46 horses and displaced backstretch workers at San Luis Rey Downs, Barretts made the decision to use its January sale to help raise funds for the victims.
“The fires were so shocking and terrible and we decided to find things that we could do to help,” said Barretts General Manager Kim Lloyd. “With the January sale coming up, we decided we would donate 10% of our proceeds and we would try to have a silent auction with stallion seasons and see what we could raise to benefit the victims. It really grew quickly and we are grateful to all the people who chipped in and donated seasons. Everybody stepped up and hopefully we’ll raise some money to make a difference for those people.”
Recently retired graded stakes winners Shaman Ghost and Danzing Candy are among the stallions who will have 2018 no-guarantee seasons auctioned off Wednesday. Also available will be seasons to Can the Man, Daddy Nose Best, Desert Code, Metaboss, Smiling Tiger, Stanford and Stay Thirsty. There will also be a silent auction of sporting art.
The seasons auction will be held at the completion of the breeding stock offerings at the mixed sale. Barretts will be donating 10% of its commissions from the sale to the California Thoroughbred Horsemen’s Foundation for victims of the fire as needed, with any remaining balance to be retained by CTHF for ongoing medical needs of all backstretch workers. All proceeds from the stallion seasons auction will also go to the CTHF.
Cautious Giant (Giant’s Causeway) was the top-priced offering at last year’s January sale, bringing a final bid of $57,000. In all, 125 horses sold at last year’s auction for a total of $995,800. The average was $7,966 and the median was $3,700.
“The main thing [with the January sale] is to provide an opportunity for our local people to continue on with the business for the rest of the year,” Lloyd said. “Breeders can sell some horses and help with their stud fees and other expenses to kick off the year. It’s a good way to move horses and raise some money for people to help them continue with their business. It’s turned into a very useful sale for our California people. And there are always horses who come out of this sale who end up being something you recognize later on at the races. It’s a useful sale and we looking forward to moving a lot of horses.”