Trainer Bob Baffert signed the ticket for $1.9 million for Vallenzeri on opening night, Monday, April 6, of Keeneland’s two-day April Two-Year-Olds in Training Sale. It is the highest price paid for a juvenile at public auction in 2009.
Cumulatively, Keeneland sold 66 horses for $11,805,000 during the April Two-Year-Olds in Training Sale, down 27.57 percent from the corresponding period last year, when 77 horses brought $16,299,000. The average of $178,864 represents a 15.50 percent decrease from $211,675 in 2008.
“This is where the Thoroughbred market is today,” said Geoffrey Russell, Keeneland’s director of sales. “But make no mistake; there is great interest in horses that have the potential to achieve what buyers see as the ultimate goal – the Kentucky Derby. Horses that stood out as classic, two-turn horses sold well.”
Baffert bought Vallenzeri, by Horse of the Year A.P. Indy out of Horse of the Year Azeri, on behalf of client Kaleem Shah. The colt breezed an eighth of a mile in :10.1 during the sale’s Preview Day show on April 2. He was consigned by Eddie Woods, agent.
“I am really excited to get him,” Baffert said. “He’s well conformed, he has a fluid way of moving, and with that type of pedigree, by a champion and out of champion, you have to step up to the plate and take a chance.”
“It is very exciting to have sold Vallenzeri,” said Russell. “Eddie Woods consigned last year’s Kentucky Derby winner (Big Brown), and he just may have sold next year’s as well.”
Baffert also paid $475,000 for a Smart Strike colt out of the Belong to Me mare Private Feeling, for Mike Pegram, Paul Weitman and Karl Watson. The colt was consigned by Jerry Bailey Sales Agency.
“I wasn’t going to go home without him,” Baffert said. “He worked well (an eighth of a mile in :10 during Thursday’s Preview Day show) and he’s a good mover.”
Altogether, Baffert purchased colts with classic potential for three different clients, including a Dixie Union colt for Hal Earnhardt for $300,000. He also paid $370,000 for a colt by Songandaprayer that posted the fastest Preview Day work, going an eighth in :9.4. Consigned by Wavertree Stables Inc, the colt is out of the unraced Storm Bird mare Beach Bunny.
The April Sale has produced two Kentucky Derby winners since its inception in 1993 – last year’s winner and champion three-year-old colt Big Brown, as well as 1995 Derby winner Thunder Gulch.
Bob Baffert has trained nine Eclipse champions, including Kentucky Derby winners Silver Charm (1997), Real Quiet (1998) and War Emblem (2002).