Tips of 2010 collect 2 wins in 2011 OBS sales stakes

This is my first blog post of 2011, for which I must apologize -- both to those who had mentioned missing my writing, and to those who are now disappointed that I wasn't gone for good. But I do have news worth mentioning from my Sales Tip Class of 2010, even though I'm belated in reporting it.

On March 14 at Ocala Training Center, two of the four restricted stakes for 3-year-olds who had gone through the sales at Ocala, were won by horses I topped at the OBS sales of last year. And they were the "big" races, too, the $100,000 OBS Championship Stakes at a mile and a sixteenth, for both the male and female divisions. A third sales tip of mine managed to place second in the filly division of the $50,000 OBS Sprint Stakes, and a fourth selection made her debut in that same race, albeit last of six.

It's hard to take much credit for DELIGHTFUL MARY, who collected her first stakes victory in the OBS Championship Stakes filly division, defeating Be My Candy by just three-quarters of a length. The Limehouse filly was the $500,000 sales-topper at OBS April; everybody recognized her talent. Still, it's good when one of the (few) expensive ones I pick, does pan out, and so far this filly has. As a 2-year-old she had two wins from four starts, with a second place in the Mazarine Breeders' Cup S.-G3 at Woodbine and a solid third in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies-G1 at Churchill in November. Delightful Mary has now earned back $370,377 of that $500,000 purchase price for owner John C. Oxley.

On the other hand, I obviously didn't have much company among the sales-day fans for REPRIZED HALO, the OBS Championship Stakes winner who sold for just $23,000 at that same OBS April auction. Yet he's been undeniably a steal of that sale. The sturdy bay colt bred by Debra and Bill Backlinie in Florida has already raced 13 times in his career. Shortly after (finally) breaking his maiden, Reprized Halo handed GOURMET DINNER (another OBS tip of mine) his first defeat in four starts last year by annexing the Florida Stallion In Reality Stakes at a whopping price of 46/1. Reprized Halo now has a 3-1-1 mark from those 13 starts, for $316,579 in earnings -- a pretty good return on that $23,000 investment by Roger Urbina.

Another relatively inexpensive choice of mine out of the OBS sales also hit the board on stakes-day this year. Take Me To Zuber, who had a win and a show from three prior starts, finished second behind One Star (and by a head over Wild Penny) in the filly division of the OBS Sprint Stakes. Take Me To Zuber was a $28,000 purchase at OBS April by owner/trainer Luis Oliveras, and now she's stakes-placed, with $26,260 banked.

Making her debut in that same OBS Sprint filly division was Prize Doll, a $17,000 RNA at OBS April. She was last throughout, but was six lengths back at first call and only finished beaten 4 1/4 lengths, which probably isn't a bad effort for an unraced filly tossed in a stakes race among more seasoned competitors. She finished only a nose and a neck out of fourth.

Granted, these races are restricted stakes -- open only to those 3-year-olds who at some point have already gone through the sales ring at Ocala. And the very best from those sales (Delightful Mary excepted, as connections apparently looked for a soft spot to make her 2011 return) typically bypass the sales stakes for bigger races.

But with more than 2,100 juveniles catalogued at OBS sales last year and another 1,100 or so from this crop going through the ring there as yearlings, that still leaves a huge pool of potential entries from which to draw. Of those couple-three-thousand 3-year-olds, I recommended 113 -- or fewer than 4 percent. And from that 3-plus percent came half of the OBS sales stakes winners, plus a second-place finisher.

That doesn't seem to shabby, if I do (belatedly) say so myself.

In the meantime, I'm still settling into Oklahoma after moving from North Carolina. When I do get fully settled, this blog will resume full-time, as will its following of those juvenile tips from 2010.