Sales Numbers

[Green Hills]

I think the expression is:

Breed the best to the best and hope (and pray) for the best.

And how true that is.

[LB]

But what if you have a nice mare with black type right under her and you breed to a nice somewhat commercial stallion but you did your research and you've bred to produce a racehorse too. But your yearling is avg size, not small, will grow to be about 16. 1" and the bid you get doesn't cover the stud fee. Now is that breeder a bad person? They did everything right, yet something went wrong, you're the victim of "fashion". Is that fair?

Short answer: life, and the Thoroughbred industry, aren't fair.

winds, I'm sure we've all been there. The hope is that you don't land in that position too many times. You can try and guess what will appeal to buyers two years down the road (approx. time from breeding to selling a yearling), but that doesn't mean they're going to agree with you when the time comes.

We have a nice mare with a commercial page, who was already the dam of a MGSW when she foaled a filly in 2004 that didn't grow up to suit the market's idea of perfect. Which is why we're now racing a (stakes placed) Street Cry filly.

Everything about breeding TBs has an element of risk. Your example above doesn't make the breeder a good person or a bad person. Despite the best laid plans, %^&# happens. And if on the day, rightly or wrongly, the market doesn't agree with you about the value of your horse...well then that's when you need to have a back-up plan.

[winds]

LB I know what you're saying and I understand it. I've been doing this long enough, I just got upset with what I saw the first day of the sale. But, KBEquine said her husband was there on day 3 and said the types of yearlings we saw going for chump change the 1st day were selling better, like they used to.

I always like Timonium because I thought as a buyer you had a fairly good chance at getting a nice raceprospect for a workable price. But as a seller you still made enough money to be in the black for the most part. Of course there are always going to be those that aren't happy, but the majority would do ok. Monday was a blood bath for average sized yearlings even with good pages and good conformation.

The tide change on day 3 so my stomache has settled and all is well with the world.

winds

[madelyn]

winds, I don't think anyone is saying breeders are "bad people." However, there are a lot of people who breed a mediocre mare to a relatively expensive stallion with the goal of ONLY selling the offspring. They have no intention of taking the baby home and actually putting it in training. They do not race any horses. I contend that if the number of those folks gets too big, it could harm the industry long term. Those are mainly the foals not covering stud fee and skewing the statistics. The sheer number of horses has a detrimental effect in that it tends to lower prices across the board.