Fasig-Tipton's Turf Showcase Sale

With lots of well-heeled European, Middle Eastern and Asian buyers in town for the million-dollar yearlings in Book 1 of the Keeneland September sale -- which started today -- the number two auction company, Fasig-Tipton, tried something new. It held a "turf showcase" yearling sale last night, aimed specifically at foreign buyers, plus those few Americans that actually like turf racing, and featuring yearlings that arguably had turf-oriented pedigrees.

Whatever spin the folks at Fasig-Tipton may put on it -- first time trying a new concept, Keeneland snagged all the best turf pedigrees anyway, etc. -- the sale was by any measure less than a rousing success, failing to pull much cash out of the pockets of those wealthy foreigners. Of 171 yearlings in the catalogue, only 41 (43.3%) were sold, bringing an average price of $68,041 and a median of $52,500. Of the 97 that didn't sell, 71 -- nearly as many as were sold -- failed to meet their reserves (i.e., were "RNA"), and the remaining 26 were scratched from the sale. You can see all the results here. Any time 49% of the horses that go through the ring at an auction fail to sell, as happened last night, that's a sign that someone, usually the sellers, had unrealistic expectations.

Another odd result, given the stated purpose of the sale -- to attract foreign buyers -- was that hardly any of the buyers were in fact foreign. It's impossible to tell for sure, when so many purchases are made by agents, but none of the usual names representing non-US interests showed up in the F-T Turf Showcase results. Nor did the very best American turf pedigrees. There were more War Front babies (4) in the first 20 hips at Keeneland today than in the entire F-T sale (1). Lots of Kitten's Joy, Gio Ponti and Temple City yearlings in both sales, but that just suggests some over-breeding.

Some American buyers may have gotten a good deal, in the absence of serious foreign money. Ahmed Zayat (with, I trust, the advice of my friends Jeff Seder and Patti Miller at EQB) picked up two at the turf showcase, a Real Solution colt for $60,000 and a War Command filly for $75,000. And leading partnership West Point Thoroughbreds snagged a colt by English sire Noble Mission for $85,000. Apart from that, it was the usual mix of owners and agents, and even a pinhhooker, Nick DeMeric, who paid the co-high price of the evening, $250,000, for a Scat Daddy colt. One never sees pinhookers in Book 1 at Keeneland, as they don't have the bottomless bankrolls to compete that other Book 1 buyers seem to possess.

Was the experiment worth it for Fasig-Tipton? My guess would be, probably not. The prices they got, and the buyers they attracted, would be just as likely at the regular F-T yearling sale in October. Credit F-T for trying something new, but not everything new works.