As the Keeneland November Breeding Stock Sale enters Book 3 Nov. 7, there are still plenty of quality bloodlines available to buyers looking for some value. Included among the offerings are mares whose families have received some key updates in recent months.
One of those mares is Currane, a 3-year-old daughter of Spendthrift Farm stallion Authentic consigned as Hip 1160 by Winter Quarter Farm.
A homebred for Waterville Lake Stables, the gray or roan filly comes from a prolific family through her dam Strike It Rich, a grade 3-winning daughter of Unbridled's Song.
Strike It Rich is the dam of multiple stakes winner Sea Foam and listed stakes-placed Straw Into Gold. Another of Currane's half siblings, the Giant's Causeway mare Gaelic Gold, is the dam of Fionn, winner of this summer's Belmont Oaks Invitational Stakes (G1T) at Saratoga Race Course.
Since the catalog was released, the daughter of Twirling Candy backed up her grade 1 win by winning the Dueling Grounds Oaks Invitational Stakes (G3T) at Kentucky Downs in September, a race worth $2 million with added money available through the Kentucky Thoroughbred Development Fund. Fionn's career earnings sit at $1,817,670 with a 6-1-1 record from nine starts.
Winter Quarter's Don Robinson knows the family very well as a longtime client of Waterville Lake Stables.
"We purchased Strike It Rich as a yearling and had basically all of her foals," he said. "She's been a really nice mare for my clients. They've raced and sold out of her, and it's gone very well. It's been a prolific family."
Currane herself raced three times for the late Christophe Clement, her last race May 3 being her best finish when second in maiden company traveling 1 1/16 miles on the Aqueduct Racetrack turf. Robinson said the filly carries her 2020 Horse of the Year and Kentucky Derby (G1)-winning sire's big frame.
"She's a really attractive physical," Robinson said. "She wasn't a great runner, but I think she's a really nice (broodmare) prospect. Very pretty mare."
According to Robinson, Waterville Lake tends to only keep fillies who have black type on their résumé. Given that they still have Strike It Rich producing, as well as several other members of the family, it provides a unique opportunity for buyers to acquire this successful bloodline.
Likewise, the family of Poetic, Hip 1358 consigned by Baldwin Bloodstock, also has seen important catalog updates in Kentucky since September.
A daughter of Violence , Poetic is out of the stakes-winning and grade 2-placed Benchmark mare Smooth Performer. Her stakes-winning Into Mischief half sister, Into Trouble, is the dam of Donamire Farm homebred Troubleshooting, who has been setting the Kentucky turf ablaze in recent months.
Since the catalog, which displays his Dade Park Dash Stakes triumph at Ellis Park in July, Troubleshooting reached top-level status with a gutsy victory in the $2 million Franklin-Simpson Stakes (G1T) at Kentucky Downs over 6 1/2 furlongs in September. The following month, he stretched out to two turns for another hard-fought victory in Keeneland's Bryan Station Stakes (G3T) over a mile against a solid field.
Into Trouble also produced multiple stakes-placed Kantharos filly Big Trouble, and Poetic's City Zip half sister, Top Performance, produced grade 3-placed Violent Runner, by Violence.
Poetic's first foal was Ah Jeez, by Mendelssohn, who placed in the 2024 Frank E. Kilroe Mile Stakes (G1T) and Thunder Road Stakes (G3T) at Santa Anita Park in a career that has accumulated $282,257 in purse earnings. She has produced one winner from her other three foals to race, three-time winner Kykeon (Kantharos), as well as Master Chief Mike, a 2-year-old Knicks Go colt who was second in his most recent start at Gulfstream Park.
"It's a super active family, super sound family," said Baldwin Bloodstock managing partner Amy Bunt. "There's not really anything that would leave you wanting. She's gorgeous, she's good-sized. Her foals have been good-sized. They've been sound. She's very pretty to look at, her baby is pretty to look at, so I think she's the full package."
According to Bunt, Poetic is set to sell with little or no reserve. Additionally, she has added value being in foal to a young, exciting stallion in two-time champion male sprinter Elite Power , who stands at Juddmonte Farms.
"There's going to be huge draw for (Elite Power)," Bunt said. "He was such a great racehorse. With stud fees as high as they are, I think it's going to push the value back to the second- and third-crop seasons. You see all the success with the first-crop sires, I think people will be pretty happy to get a mare in foal to that kind of stallion."
Prospective buyers have an early chance to see what the Elite Power/Poetic mating can produce as the next offering, Hip 1359, is Poetic's 2025 weanling filly from Elite Power's first crop.
"She's a really nice foal, a really nice walker," Bunt said of the dark bay or brown filly bred by Machmer Hall. "Vets great, correct, basically like the rest of her family."
