Lows go to $750,000 to secure Tapit colt

Owners Robert and Lawana Low spent $750,000 on their next two-turn hopeful during the second session of the Ocala Breeders' Sales April two-year-olds in training sale on. The Lows own Kentucky Derby contender Magnum Moon.

Jacob West, the Low's racing manager and bloodstock agent, signed the ticket on a grey or roan colt by Tapit out of Flaming Heart, the dam of multiple Graded stakes winners Commissioner and Laugh Track.

"I mean Tapit needs no introduction. He is a three-quarters brother to a horse that just missed an American classic in Commissioner. And there is a big update in the family, as he's a half brother to the dam of Vino Rosso," West said.

"It is a real stallion's pedigree with Tapit out of a Touch Gold mare. He can run all day. We are looking for two-turn classic horses and that is what he was to us. We have had a lot of luck with May foals that have gone two turns, like Magnum Moon. It has worked out well for us."

Yoshida buys Good Magic half-brother for $700,000

Living up to his billing, a Speightstown half-brother to Good Magic, champion two-year-old male of 2017 and top contender for the Kentucky Derby, brought $700,000 during the second session on Wednesday.

Narvick International's Emmanuel de Seroux signed for the colt on behalf of Katsumi Yoshida and partners. The colt will be sent to Japan, according to de Seroux.

As de Seroux signed the ticket, he brought himself full circle with the colt's family. Fourteen years ago, the bloodstock agent and adviser selected 81 mares for Stonestreet Stables founder Jess Jackson at the 2004 Keeneland November breeding stock sale to be the foundation broodmare band at a Kentucky farm Jackson had just acquired.

Among those mares was Magical Flash, a daughter of Miswaki that had already produced three black-type winners when Jackson bought her for $140,000. The mare's pedigree would get another important update in 2006 when her daughter Take the Ribbon finished second in the Garden City Breeders' Cup Stakes and in 2007 won the Churchill Distaff Turf Mile Stakes.

Magical Flash continued producing quality runners for Stonestreet, including black-type homebred Glinda the Good, who is the dam of Good Magic (by Curlin ) and the Speightstown colt de Seroux bought at OBS out of Niall Brennan's consignment, named Wicked Wizard.

"Obviously, he has a fantastic pedigree, and he is by Speightstown, who has done very well in Japan so we have very high hopes for him," de Seroux said. "He has a stallion's pedigree, so if he wins a group for us, there is a lot of potential. We thought he was a good value."

Bred by Stonestreet Thoroughbred Holdings, Wicked Wizard was purchased for $200,000 by Paul Roy at the 2017 Keeneland September Yearling Sale out of the Taylor Made Sales consignment. Roy intended to race the colt in England but changed plans after Good Magic won the Breeders' Cup Juvenile and was named champion. Good Magic secured a place in the Kentucky Derby field when he won the Grade 2 Blue Grass Stakes.

Wicked Wizard arrived at Brennan's training center between Christmas and New Year's Day to begin preparing for the April sale.

"It was the only sale he could make and have a chance. He was only just under tack," said Brennan prior to the horse getting sold. "He's made amazing progress to get here, considering all the travel back and forth, but he has knuckled down in his training and done very well. He's growing, he's improved, and he's gotten stronger."

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