In both 2023 and 2024, bloodstock agent Donato Lanni signed a ticket for the highest-priced horse in The Saratoga Sale, Fasig-Tipton's select yearling sale, buying on behalf of Zedan Racing.
Lanni and Zedan won't go three in a row, but they came close during the second session of this year's sale, going to $2.9 million for Hip 179, a Gun Runner colt out of the Tapit mare Princesa Carolina.
Just one hip earlier, an Into Mischief colt dropped the hammer for $3 million, and another Into Mischief, Hip 218, topped the sale at $4.1 million as one of the last through the ring.
"It's a crazy market," Lanni said. "What cost $2 million last year is costing $3 million this year."
Consigned by Four Star Sales, agent, the colt was bred in Kentucky by Three Chimneys Farm.
Princesa Carolina, a daughter of grade 1 winner Pure Clan, was a multiple graded stakes-placed, stakes-winning mare whose 2022 filly by Munnings , Muhimma, won last year's Demoiselle Stakes (G2) at Aqueduct Racetrack. Muhimma, a $700,000 yearling purchase for Shadwell Stable, is also twice graded stakes-placed in 2025 as a 3-year-old, running third in both the Honeybee Stakes (G3) and the Ashland Stakes (G1). Trained by Brad Cox, she has bankrolled nearly $400,000.
The progeny of Gun Runner have been in demand at the sale, with five of his nine yearlings to go through the ring bringing seven figures, and three selling for more than $2 million.
"This horse is such a cool dude," Lanni said of Hip 179. "He's very unassuming; he just stands there, and when he starts moving, he's a very beautiful mover. He's very smart and looks like a real honest horse."
"He's got a good pedigree and looks fast," said Bob Baffert, who will train the horse. "We're happy that we got him. Good horses bring the money, and he looks like a horse with a lot of upside."
Gun Runner finished 2024 ranked second on the North American general sires list, a position that he currently holds. The sire of Sierra Leone, who won the Whitney Stakes (G1) Aug. 2 at Saratoga Race Course, Gun Runner has produced 10 grade 1 winners and 15 millionaires from five crops of racing age, including 2-year-olds of 2025. He was inducted into the National Museum of Racing Hall of Fame last year. Standing at Three Chimneys Farm, he commanded a $250,000 stud fee this year.
