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For those of you who wait all year to enjoy the Keeneland breeding stock catalog, it's online now. I'm spending a few minutes searching for my list of favorite mares... we'll be talking about this sale a lot in the next few weeks.  Any first impressions after seeing the catalog?

Whatever the state of the national and world economies at large, it appears that the Thoroughbred breeding industry is still quite a distance from seeing any light at the end of our sport's tunnel of recession. We experienced a rare and significant drop in the number of mares bred in 2009, and it's hardly a secret that prospects for the 2010 ...

In a post three weeks ago, I asked Are Names an Advantage at Yearling Sales? and indicated that I was surprised by the apparent advantage of named hips at the Keeneland September sale in recent years.  I promised to take a closer look -- comparing named versus unnamed foals by book rather than across the whole sale to eliminate any skew that ...

I arrived back home in Lexington yesterday morning after a much-enjoyed week of sunny relaxation on the Florida Gulf. Because of friends' status updates on Facebook (sad but true), I knew Kentucky had experienced a week of non-stop rain, and that the temperatures had dropped a bit. I guess I sort of ignored the news though (it was in the 90s and ...

It was during the Keeneland September auction a year ago that we first saw the devastating impact of a plummeting economy on Thoroughbred sales. The large scale of the industry's largest yearling sale makes it a bellwether for every tier of commercial Thoroughbred breeding, and it quickly became clear that the recession would leave little room for ...

Just two weeks ago, in a column on sire lines represented at the Keeneland September sale, we noticed that the Byerly/Herod line was a big fat zero -- not a single foal offered. But, then, really not surprising, since the line has long been dormant in North America.  Well, since then another headline has hit the news that concerns ...

... buy, buy again!  Or, that's what Keeneland is hoping you'll do, at least.  The Thoroughbred sales company has opened up RNAs from its premier yearling sale to an electronic re-bid program. Keeneland asks would-be buyers to take a second look at first-class horses. The program allows consignors whose colt or filly didn't sell in the ...

Most Thoroughbred breeders and consignors know there's a lot more going on in the sales ring than the best horse bringing the highest price. Conformation and catalog page usually combine to determine whether a horse goes in Book One or Book Six at the Keeneland September sale, for example, but lots of other factors are at play as well. ...

In my The Five-Cross Files blog, I recently wrote about a few Stallion Register Online enhancements that will make the Thoroughbred stallion directory even more useful. Here are the highlights:   Video:  If you're interested in a stallion, it's only natural that you'll want to see his top performers. The Stallion Register ...

In an upcoming issue of The Blood-Horse MarketWatch, pedigree expert Avalyn Hunter (''Mahubah's Corner'') will explore the widely-held belief that wins in specific races are a good predictor of future stallion success. In addition to the research we're doing to see if this is actually true, we'd like to get a good idea about what our readers ...