'I believe she will carry her racing success into the next generation' - Grade 1 winner Vahva to be offered at Keeneland

Grade 1 winner Vahva is to be offered in Book 1 of Keeneland's November Breeding Stock Sale on Tuesday, November 4. Lane’s End will consign the millionairess, who is catalogued as a racing or broodmare prospect and will be the first top level-winning female by the sire to be offered at public auction.

Vahva is nominated to the Grade 2 Thoroughbred Club of America on Saturday during Fall Stars Weekend on Keeneland’s opening three days.

"Vahva is a high-class competitor who has faced and defeated many of the sport’s most talented female sprinters in each of the past three seasons,” Keeneland vice-president of sales Tony Lacy said.

"A leading earner by Gun Runner, she will be a valuable addition to any programme. Her Graded stakes success at Keeneland makes her return to our sales ring especially meaningful, underscoring the unique connection between our racing and sales."

In four seasons of racing, Vahva has raced at seven tracks with seven victories, including five stakes wins, and earnings of $2,041,010. Last year, she bankrolled nearly $1 million with a campaign that featured a two-length victory in the Grade 1 Derby City Distaff on Kentucky Derby Day at Churchill Downs, where she next took the Grade 3 Chicago Stakes.

This year, Vahva captured the Chicago, which was upgraded to a Grade 2 event, for the second consecutive season. The goal for her connections is the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint ahead of the sale.

"I’ve been fortunate to be around many successful mares, and Vahva has all the characteristics you look for in a future broodmare," David Ingordo of Lane’s End Farm said.

"She is both elegant and strong with the kind of speed you want to see in a broodmare prospect, and I believe she will carry her racing success into the next generation.

"It is strategic on our part to sell Vahva at Keeneland because we believe in the reinvestment of their dollars into the industry and community. I also believe that being able to train her at Keeneland has played a huge role in her development and success."

The Cherie DeVaux-trained Vahva is out of stakes winner Holiday Soiree, a Grade 1-placed daughter of Harlan’s Holiday, whose daughter by City of Light commanded $850,000 at the recent Keeneland September Yearling Sale.

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