Hibiscus Adds Two New Horses to the Stable

Hibiscus Stables is delighted to present the two newest additions to its stables - the result of a successful visit to the Ocala sale.  Interest has been great from current and new partners and Hibiscus could not be more pleased with the quality of these new additions.

Orientate Filly - Orientate is a multiple graded stakes winner of over $1.7 million including the G1 Forego Handicap and the G1 Breeders' Cup Sprint. Orientate won an Eclipse Award as a champion sprinter. This filly's dam, Britetonzmyday, is a multiple stakes winner herself and banked $199,765 over the course of her career.

We had this horse in our personal top 5 of the sale and both Linda and Steve had this horse on their "A" lists independent of each other. Like last year with Salt Water Reign, the planets all lined up for this horse and we're elated to have her.

She'll be trained by Linda Rice. Linda's plan is to give her 30 days on the farm in Ocala to wind down from the sale, and then ship her north to Belmont to begin training.

Find out more by viewing the Orientate Filly Video and Fact Sheet.
 

Mayakovsky Colt - This colt is a son of stakes winner Mayakovsky. Mayakovsky won the G3 Gotham Stakes in wire-to-wire fashion with a Beyer Speed Figure of 102 and ran second in the G1 Hopeful Stakes at Saratoga. Additionally Mayakovsky broke a 55-year-old Saratoga track record in his 2-year-old debut going 5 1/2 furlongs in 1:03 1/5. Our horse's dam, Smooth Blues, a Cure The Blues mare, is a winner at 3, 4 and 5 and banked $259,960.

This colt breezed an eighth in the OBS under tack show in 10.3. He'll be trained by Steve Klesaris.

Find out more by viewing the Mayakovsky Colt Video and Fact Sheet.

Kentucky Derby Trivia

On the heels of this year's Kentucky Derby, this month's newsletters offers up trivia questions
on the first leg of the Triple Crown.

See end of newsletter for answers.

The Ocala Chronicles
A Daily Diary from the OBS Spring Sale

The OBS Spring Sale of Two-Year-Olds in Training, aka. The April Sale, is probably the sale that I look forward to the most.  This year there were 1399 horses in the catalog and there’s usually something here for everyone.  Owners, trainers, consigners, and pinhookers from all over the country descend on Ocala to reconnect with old friends, meet new ones, buy horses during the day, and have a few (or more) drinks at night. 

Sunday

Al, Doris Ann and I caught a 9:00 AM flight from La Guardia and arrived at Orlando International a bit before noon.  We got our rental car and immediately drove to OBS…we couldn’t wait to get on the sales grounds and start to examine horses on our buy lists.  By the time we got there it was around 2:30 PM and we immediately hit barn 12 and began to pull horses out for inspection.  I was extremely disappointed to find out that hip 132, a filly by G1 winner Deputy Commander and Axe Creek, the dam of two other stakes winners Cloon and Celtic Sky, had been withdrawn from the sale.  This filly sat at the very top of my list and I had been looking forward to seeing this horse for a while.  We only had time to visit a few barns that afternoon but we did manage to see hip 198, a filly by champion Orientate and the stakes winning mare Briteonzmyday that was in my top 5.  We liked this horse very much.  Towards the very end of the day we linked up with Linda Rice and compared notes.  Linda had only scouted horses in the first half of the sale and hip 198 was on her list.  We knew we’d be bidding on the Orientate.  After chatting with Linda we met up with Diane Allen who was doing advanced scouting for Steve Klesaris.  She also had 198 on her list along with some others.  We agreed to meet up with her early Monday morning to continue to examine other horses on our lists.  We were all exhausted from traveling so we grabbed a quick bite and got to sleep early. 

Monday

Monday wasn’t very eventful as we spent most of the day on the OBS grounds looking at horses from my list and also from Diane’s as we assembled our list of horses for Tuesday.  The plan all along was to give one horse to Linda and one to Steve.  Once we complied our list of horses for the next day’s session we gave that list to Steve and he lined up a vet in the morning to scope them all.  Any horses that failed the scope were eliminated and the ones that passed were on the buy list for bidding. 

After our day at OBS we decided to catch happy hour at the Hilton.  There we met with the General Manager and struck up a conversation with him.  He wound up buying us a round of drinks and told us to contact him whenever we were arriving in town, as he’d make sure we’d have rooms at the Hilton, the classiest hotel in town.  A nice connection. 

Tuesday

We arrived at the sale grounds around 10 AM and were very excited.  There was a Precise End colt that Steve absolutely loved; hip number 75.  We knew we’d be involved in the bidding on that one.  Then, of course, the Orientate number 198.  We settled into our seats right before 75 entered the ring.  I had Steve on the phone.  The bidding was deliberate and steady increasing right through our budget.  Steve loved this horse so much that every time we were outbid I would speak into the phone, “They just bumped us.  What do you want to do?”  I could barely finish my sentence before Steve would say, “Hit it!”  We took it up as far as we could go but the other bidder (there was only one other at that point) kept bumping us.  The gavel came down and we were not the winner.  Al had strolled over and sat behind the other bidder and reported that they weren’t stopping any time soon.  He could see they were going to bump us for quite a bit more.  We felt bad but philosophically knew we weren’t likely to get that horse.  We grabbed lunch and returned to our “lucky” seats and hunkered down for hip 198.  This horse was near the top of all of our lists, but since Linda had brought it to us first so we decided it would go to Linda.  We set a budget and, since Linda liked it so much she agreed to add more money to the pot and take more than her 10% share if necessary.  I was cautiously optimistic hoping we’d land the horse but part of me couldn’t imagine it not going for well over our budget considering the breeding.  Doris Ann sat next to me and Al strolled away again to survey the scene.  We were all elated when the gavel came down and we were the owners.  This horse would fit perfectly into our program (state-bred filly by a solid open company sire and a stakes-winning mare).   

We all high-fived and decided to go to the Hilton for happy hour.  While sitting at the bar we bumped into Dave McKathen, the consigner of hip 75, the Precise End.  We told him that we were the under-bidder and that we were disappointed that we didn’t land the colt.  He told us that the eventual winning bidders were a group from Puerto Rico and that the plan was to ship the horse to run there.  We were surprised and disappointed considering that this horse was a New York state-bred.  We couldn’t understand why it was going to be run out of the country.  Later we met Carlos Martin, a local trainer who has a stable at Belmont.  It turns out that he’s a childhood friend of John and Rob Toscano, good friends of ours who are also owners and run their horses in New York.  Carlos is an incredibly funny guy.  We invited him to join us for dinner and it was a virtual comedy show.  We agreed to hook up with Carlos once we got back to New York, as he’s a regular good guy. 

Wednesday

Wednesday was somewhat uneventful as, amazingly, none of us had any horses that we liked that were going through the ring that day.  We decided to take “a personal day” since there was no action for us at OBS.  We took a drive out to Cloverleaf Farm to visit our City Zip filly that’s in our pinhook program.  She’s doing extremely well out there.  She’s such a sweetheart that she loves to have her nose stroked.  We hung out at her stall and she continually nuzzled us with her nose so we would keep rubbing it.  She reminds me of a puppy. 

Thursday

We arrived at OBS around 10 AM on Thursday.  The routine was very similar that day.  We had a list of horses that Steve and Diane liked.  We had them all scoped.  The ones that passed the exam were added to our bid list.  Turns out we had three horses that we liked all within 10 hips of each other.  That was going to be a busy 30 minutes for us.  To make a long story short we were outbid on the first one, found out that the second one had bone chips, and were outbid on the third one.  It was mid-afternoon and we were shut out.  It got progressively hotter each day in Florida and Thursday was getting near 90.  We decided that it was a good time to go back to the Hilton. 

While hanging out at the bar Diane introduced us to Greg Gilchrest.  Greg was the trainer of Eclipse Award winner Lost In The Fog who was euthanized last September after complications from cancer.  In this world you’ll meet all kinds of people…some nice others not so nice.  Greg is one of the true good guys in the sport.  We sat there and listened to all kinds of interesting stories about racing from a previous era and some amazing stories about Lost In The Fog.  We invited Greg to join us for dinner and it turned out to be a very interesting and entertaining evening.  You can’t help but like Greg and we’re privileged to have met him. 

Friday

Friday morning we rendezvoused with Diane and got immediately to work.  We were at the last day of the sale and still had several excellent prospects on our list.  We zeroed in on two; a Mayakovsky colt and a Running Stag filly.  Both scoped clean and we were ready to bid.  The Mayakovsky came into the ring first and I had Steve on the phone.  I asked him, “If this horse was going on Day 1 would we still be bidding on him?”  Steve said, “Absolutely.”  I needed to make sure that we were buying a horse that we truly believed in and not just filling a need.  We landed him well under budget and were finally able to relax. 

We left OBS around 5 PM in order to catch an 8:45 flight home.  You’d think I would have learned by now to avoid that flight but, sadly, no.  As with every other time I’ve taken that flight home it’s been delayed and Friday was no different.  It didn’t take off until 11:00 PM and I didn’t get to sleep until 3:30 AM on Saturday.  I slept well that night because we returned home meeting all of our goals.  We acquired two nice horses; one for Steve and one for Linda.  Both were within our budget.  We met some really nice people such as Carlos and Greg.  I can’t express my appreciation enough for Diane Allen.  Her reputation precedes her, which is great.  But beyond that we got to experience first hand her knowledge of horses and her expertise in identifying good ones.  For me the most gratifying part of the entire experience was working with Doris Ann and Al as a team.   We’ve been partners for awhile but it’s the first time we all attended a sale together.  Teamwork is a powerful thing, both when present and when absent.  When absent, no matter how hard you try, you struggle and become frustrated.  When present things seem to operate like a well-oiled machine and the whole can become greater than the sum of the parts.  It’s the latter that I observed during this trip.  Hibiscus has a great team behind it and I’m confident that there are more good things to come.  I look forward to watching our Orientate and Mayakovsky develop into fine racehorses and get to the races.  The first time I stand in the winner’s circle with either of those horses I’ll reflect back on all the hard work that went into getting them here.  I excitedly look forward to the next sale and working together with my partners and friends, Doris Ann, Al, Steve, and Diane to find the next Hibiscus runner.

- Mike Oliveto, Hibiscus Stables

Hibiscus Stables Partner Spotlight: Lonny Unger

Lonny's been going to the track since age 17 and has owned a harness horse 20 years ago. He's always had a desire to own horses again and "Hibiscus Stables offered a terrific opportunity to do this."

Answers to Trivia:  A, D, B, Stephen Foster