Full Disclosure

I have written several times that it the intention of this author to remain positive. However, the facts are the facts.

I did a little research into the results of the 2019 sale held at Lone Star (the sale was canceled in 2020). It is a little difficult to do. You have to enter the name of the mare into the Pedigree Online database to get the name of the horse, and then use Equibase to get the results. It took about 3 hours to do the top 30 horses.

The results were shocking.

Ten of the top 30 horses did not even make it to the track. The top 2 horses sold for $150,000 and the 30th horse sold for $22,000.

From the 2019 Lone Star 2 year old sale, the 20 horses that made it to the track made an average of $32,000. These results were aided by the top earners that made over $100,000 on the track, but only by being entered in claiming races very early in their careers. Not a single horse of this 30 won an allowance race at a track other than Lone Star, Remington, or Sam Houston. None ran an Equibase fig over 90 (roughly and 80 Beyer). Two of the bigger winners were aided by winning the Futurity races that this sale conducts, which have decent purses (one Futurity winner won with a Equibase fig of 70).

The 30 horses sold for roughly $1,400,000 and earned $650,000 before adding any training costs. If the average horse that ran was in training for 12 months, and the cost of training was $3,000/month, the cost for just the running horses would be $720,000 (this assumes no cost for the 10 horses that never ran).

The sale was a complete wipeout. The average return was roughly $0 on an average cost of $45,000/horse. Maybe this figure is a little low if the horses were mercifully claimed early in their careers from their original buyers. It is possible some of the fillies have some residual value as mares. Maybe some of these horses will have great records as 5 year olds, but I doubt it. Maybe there is a great horse that sold for under $20,000. Remember I added no costs for the horses that never ran, and $3,000/month is a rate that really assumes not vet costs.

The world would be a better place if the the individual sales would fully disclose the eventual winnings of their graduates, but they never will.

Caveat emptor, “let the buyer beware”

In all fairness, I have not done similar calculations for the other sales (Ocala, Gultstream, Timonium) and I have not done the prior years for Lone Star. I know that two horses I “selected” out of the Ocala sale last year won the G2 Remsen, and the G1 American Pharoah. The horses from the Lone Star sale have an extra year, and their results are nowhere near the Ocala sale.

My plan is to watch the sale with great interest, and then keep careful track of how the horse run going forward. My expectations are low, very low, but maybe there is a gem in there somewhere.