Japan Racing Association breeze-up sale becomes online-only auction

Three major two-year-old in training sales scheduled to take place in Japan at the end of April to the middle of May have undergone significant changes in their structure as organisers take new countermeasures to address the current, if extraordinary, circumstances surrounding the Covid-19 pandemic.

The Japan Racing Association's Breeze-Up Sale, which was originally scheduled to take place at Nakayama Racecourse on April 28, has been restructured as an online auction only.

Conformation photos, videos of walking and breezes, as well as veterinarian reports including scopes will be available for all 83 catalogued horses on the JRA website.

The organisation will accept virtual bids from buyers over a three-day period from April 28 until April 30.

The Hidaka Breeders' Association's Hokkaido Training Sale, scheduled to take place at Sapporo Racecourse on May 12, has been cancelled.

The 162 juvenile colts and fillies originally catalogued will now be sold via private sale only and consignors and domestic agents have already begun doing the groundwork to match horses with new owners.

The Chiba Agricultural Cooperative's Thoroughbred Sale, scheduled at Funabashi Racecourse on May 15, has been postponed. From the 75 ready-to-run lots entered in the sale, the withdrawal of four horses has already been announced.

The remaining 71 horses will breeze and subsequently be sold at Funabashi on June 5.

The featured lot of the catalogue is hip 36, a colt by the late Deep Impact out of Bay To Bay, a multiple Graded stakes winner in Canada who also finished second in the 2012 Jenny Wiley Stakes at Keeneland. The colt is a half-brother to Suave Aramis, winner of the Grade 3 March Stakes at Nakayama last month.

For more news on US racing, sales and bloodstock news visit bloodhorse.com