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With the Barretts March Sale of 2-year-olds in training coming up next week, TrueNicks turns the spotlight on the West Coast, with some notes on the TrueNicks top 10 rated horses in the sale.

The highest rated sale horse, hip #49, is bred for speed, being a son of grade I winning sprinter Trippi. Out of Meteoric, a daughter of Pentelicus who set a track-record for 4 1/2 furlongs at Delaware Park. Both Trippi's sire, End Sweep, and that stallion's son Precise End have sired stakes winners out of daughters of Pentelicus. There is an extra twist here, as both Trippi and Pentelicus are Mr. Prospector/In Reality crosses.

Hip #133 is a colt by the exciting young stallion Harlan's Holiday. He is out of the Alydar mare Alygator, and the cross of Harlan and his son, Menifee, over Alydar-line mares has produced four stakes winners. Alygator is granddam of stakes winner Storm Rolling In, who is by a son of Storm Cat (grandsire of Harlan's Holiday).

From the first crop of Tapit comes hip #19, a colt out of the Copelan mare Ideal Index, a sister to stakes winners Quality Exchange and Basic Exchange. This colt is a half brother to Cool Ashlee, a stakes winner who was also runner-up in the Mazarine Breeders' Cup Stakes (gr. I). We can note that Tapit's sire, Pulpit, has two stakes winners, including grade I winner Purge (TrueNicks, SRO), out of another Copelan mare.

Another young A.P. Indy-line sire with his first crop currently 2 is Friends Lake. He has an A++ rated colt in hip #91, a son of Sleep Away Camp, a Bertrando mare who is already dam of stakes-placed Spooked (by Silver Ghost). From very limited opportunities, there are already two stakes winners by A.P. Indy sons out of Bertrando mares, and this is an extension of the successful A.P. Indy/Relaunch cross.

Hip #76 is a filly from the first crop of Medaglia d'Oro (TrueNicks, SRO). The dam, the Sorority Stakes (gr. III) third Runaway Chanel, is half sister to the La Brea Stakes (gr. I) heroine Got Koko. Runaway Chanel is a daughter of Runaway Groom, and Medaglia d'Oro's sire, El Prado (TrueNicks, SRO), has three stakes winners out of Runaway Groom mares, including grade III winner Air Rocket.

Maryland-based Storm Cat son Lion Hearted is the sire of hip #10, a filly out of Highest Offer, a half sister to graded winner Upper Noosh. The Storm Cat/Forty Niner cross has worked well in general, and this one gets an A++ rating on the basis of sons of Storm Cat with mares by Forty Niner's son Roar, the sire of Highest Offer. It's worth noting that Lion Hearted is a Northern Dancer/Raise a Native cross, where Roar reverses the cross. The Raise a Native strains come through the genetic relatives Alydar and Mr. Prospector.

With the likes of Grasshopper and Fierce Wind, Dixie Union is off to a good start in 2008. He has a filly here - hip #33 - that is the first foal of stakes winner Lakeville. As Lakeville is by the Seattle Slew-line stallion Evansville Slew, this rates an A++ on the basis of the Dixie Union/Seattle Slew cross (although we should note that the three stakes winners to date bred on the cross are out of mares by A.P. Indy).

Hip #176, a chestnut son of More Than Ready (TrueNicks, SRO) out of Exquisite Mistress, is a brother to Ready's Gal (winner of four graded stakes, and also runner-up in the Frizette Stakes (gr. I), and three-parts relative to the graded stakes-winning and grade I-placed Ready to Please.

We have noted a filly from the first crop of Medaglia d'Oro, and hip #140 is a colt by the same stallion. He is a half brother to the graded stakes-winning and grade I-placed Anklet, stakes winner Spangled, and stakes-placed Awe That, herself dam of the multiple graded stakes-winning Bel Air Beauty. Out of the Alysheba mare Bangled, he achieves his A++ rating on the basis of the El Prado/Alydar cross, that has produced four stakes winners including grade I winner Borrego, and graded winners Chindi, Buffalo Man, and Timo.

The top 10 are rounded out by hip #156, a son of Forestry (TrueNicks, SRO), bred on the Storm Cat/Notebook cross that is most notably also produced the excellent sprinter Gators N Bears (TrueNicks,

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