The first juvenile sale of the year begins March 15 at Ocala Breeders’ March sale 2-year-old sale in training with a cramped booth and key players on site to auction off the agile 2-year-old with the hope of having future champions. The day is marked by the two sons of Spendthrift Farm’s Into Mischief who sold for $1.1 million and $1 million, respectively.
“It’s great to have two horses bringing in a million dollars plus and it’s exciting to have that on the first sale of the year,” said OBS sales manager Tod Wojciechowski. “It’s a testament to what the shippers have to offer. It’s a good day.”
OBS reported 188 horses sold from the 227 offered at Tuesday’s opening session with $26,325,000 in sales. The median is $140,027 and the median is $77,500. All figures show a significant increase from 2021. The 39 unsold horses represent an RNA ratio of 17.2%.
“We certainly expected the market strength we saw last year to overcome and it looks like it certainly will,” Wojciechowski commented. “We still have a lot of good horses to ride tomorrow; I’m nervous and excited about that.”
Tod Wojciechowski
From the opening session of the new sale in March 2021, OBS reported 175 horses sold from 203 offered for a total of $19,125,500, a median of $55,000 and a median of 109,289 dollars. A total of 32 horses went unsold during that session with an RNA rate of 15.7%. These adjusted figures include post-sale transactions.
Two calves led by stallions Into Mischief Day 1. First foal, a foal flew out Not for love mare Zapara, Japanese trainer Hideyuki Mori discounted $1.1 million for owner Susumu Fujita. Signed by Eddie Woods, dealer, as Hip 257, the foal got up and running quickly, going the eighth mile at: 09 4/5 on the second day of the show.
Not long after the pony broke the seven-figure cap, another son of Into Mischief brought in $1 million for shipper Sequel Bloodstock, agent for breeders Chester and Mary Broman. The foal has been secured cooperation within Spendthrift, BSW/Crow Colts Group, and his breeders. He is denoted as Hip 277 and has a smith-like breeze: 10 1/5 per mile eight. New York dog breed was bred out of Roman ruler mare Artemis Agrotera 1st place winner and bet maker Chestertown .
A total of six minors brought in over $500,000 and were secured by six different buyers, with nine different activities signing tickets for the top 10 sold.
Wojciechowski added: “We had a good set of buyers today, both international and domestic. Buyers from Japan, Europe – that’s deep buying today,” added Wojciechowski. “We’re hopeful about these results, based on the work we’ve been doing on the basis of that over the past few days.”
At the end of the first session, delivery man Eddie Woods led with total sales of $3,042,000 for the first nine units sold. Hideyuki Mori of Japan secured the top offer of the day and three others became the top buyers of the day with a total spend of $1,650,000.
Summerfield Sales’ Francis Vanlangendonck, the newly elected OBS board chairman, noted: “When the horses look like they’re part of the way down the track during the show, it hardly matters who they are from. – they’re selling really, really. Good today. It’s important to me that the horses are selling for $75,000 or less. There’s a growing market for that (segment), which we haven’t been here in a while at this sale. I love that they’re on sale too. It’s huge.”
“Good horses are bringing in good money,” commented dealer Jacob West. “What is considered good here is good, and these people are being paid for it. Horses considered bad are being reflected (in the results) as bad. Overall, horses are being traded. and that’s the important thing.
“We haven’t bought anything yet,” West added. “We tried. It was strong. We have a handful we care about tomorrow, so we’ll be here and ready to go.”
The OBS March sale ends Wednesday, with the final session kicking off at 10:30 a.m. ET with Hips 317-635.
