LEXINGTON, Ky. – A $350,000 colt from the first crop of Jack Christopher led the way as the Fasig-Tipton Kentucky July selected yearling sale opened the yearling season in North America by tying its record median.
The single-session sale Tuesday at Fasig-Tipton’s Newtown Paddocks facility finished with 157 yearlings sold through the ring – private sales may later take place – for gross receipts of $16,898,000. At last year’s sale, 154 sold through the ring, before any private sales were factored in, for $17,319,000.
The average price was $107,631, down 4 percent from last year, when horses sold through the ring averaged $112,461. The median was $90,000, equaling the sale record. The mark was first established in 2006 and matched in 2022 and 2024.
The buyback rate was 28 percent, an improvement from 33 percent last year. Across the board, Thoroughbred sales have developed a highly selective marketplace, and at this point of the season, supply-and-demand economics mean buyers can afford to be even more choosy starting out.
“People are just – and they’re allowed to be – selective. At this stage of the year, especially,” said Allaire Ryan, sales director for Lane’s End. “So that’s kind of what we’re seeing now, our best physicals are doing great, and the ones you can kind of fault here or there, for one reason or another, are slower.”
The Fasig-Tipton July sale is known as a showcase for precocious yearlings with strong physicals. Ryan also noted that at this point of the year, there are options for horses who did not meet their reserves at the July sale to come back later in the season, with more time to mature.
“I think anything that doesn’t get [sold] here you’ll most likely see in October – and that’s great that you still have that option at this stage,” she said.
The July sale began with a showcase section for first-crop yearling sires, and the sale-topper emerged from that section and held on throughout the day. The Jack Christopher colt who led the action was purchased by China Horse Club and WinStar Farm’s Maverick Racing.
Multiple Grade 1 winner Jack Christopher, by Munnings, stands alongside his sire at Coolmore’s Ashford Stud in Kentucky. He was by no means a one-hit wonder on Tuesday, with nine of his 10 yearlings led to the ring selling, three of them for more than $200,000.
Munnings stamps his offspring very much like himself, and Jack Christopher seems to be doing the same.
“He’s a very well-credentialed racehorse who showed an awful lot of precocity in winning his three Grade 1s,” said Adrian Mansergh Wallace, part of the nominations and sales division at Coolmore America. His progeny “tend to look a little bit like him. They’re generally well-conformed horses, they look fast, they hopefully will be early. If they continue to stoke the buyers’ enthusiasm, you hope he’ll have a great sale season. It’s a great start for him.”
Jack Christopher’s top-priced colt, consigned by Buckland Sales, as agent, is out of the winning Discreetly Mine mare Above the Crowd. Her only starter is a multi-time winner by Munnings, thus bred on the same cross as this colt.
Overall, first-crop yearling sires finished with four of the day’s top five prices. Jack Christopher put another in that group with a $270,000 colt purchased by Kenny McPeek. Other first-crop sires near the top of the leaderboard were multiple Grade 1 winner Cyberknife, with a $330,000 colt purchased by Mahmud Mouni; and champion Jackie’s Warrior, with a $310,000 filly purchased by Canello Bloodstock Services.
“It’s as deep a first-year bench as I can remember,” said Price Bell Jr., general manager of Mill Ridge Farm.
The second-highest price of the day came from a proven sire breaking through the first-year juggernaut, as McPeek went to $345,000 for a Vekoma filly. This is the third crop for the stallion who was 2024’s leading freshman sire.
“I just thought she was an exceptional standout,” McPeek said after signing the ticket. “I think she’s very much a [two-turn] type filly – you know, Alcibiades, Ashland, Kentucky Oaks, Alabama – fingers crossed, that kind of filly. But it looked like she had that Vekoma speed and looked like she could carry it – nice, long hip on her.”
The filly, who was consigned by Shawhan Place, as agent, is the first foal out of the Bernardini mare Sundar. Grade 1 winner Better Lucky appears on the page.
For hip-by-hip results from the July yearling sale, which was immediately followed by Fasig-Tipton's horses of racing age sale, click here.
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