Clay Buys Pair of Classy Colts for Wathnan Racing

In the closing stages of the Fasig-Tipton Midlantic May 2-Year-Olds in Training Sale's final session May 19, Case Clay snapped up two colts for $750,000 apiece: Hip 581 by Jackie's Warrior and Hip 583 by Into Mischief on behalf of Wathnan Racing. Clay, the racing manager in the United States for Wathnan Racing, which is a Thoroughbred racing group for Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, Emir of Qatar, said he was seeking two-turn dirt colts and fillies. Hip 581 is out of the stakes-placed Pure Prize mare Vagabond Princess and was bred in Kentucky by Barry Fowler, Mark Taylor, Brad McNulty, William Sparks, and Kathy Houlihan. "I fell in love with him physically when I saw him," Clay said. "His preview video was great. It's nice to be able to see them going over the dirt." Just two hips later, Clay secured Hip 583, a son of perennial leading sire Into Mischief out of the graded stakes-winning mare Verdana Bold. She is the dam of two stakes winners, including the multiple stakes-winning and graded stakes-placed Into Mischief mare Lucrezia, who has most recently been recognized as the dam of the Flightline colt who sold for $10.5 million to Zedan Racing Stables at the Ocala Breeders' Sales Spring 2-Year-Olds in Training Sale. "We bought a 2-year-old out of Ghalia in the same family, so we like the family obviously, and really like the individual," Clay said. "What grabbed me the most about him was the preview video, the rider just sat still on him, and Lucan (Bloodstock) does an outstanding job of selling horses and horses going to the races. He has great results." Last year, Clay bought a Not This Time colt out of Hip 583's half sister Ghalia (Medaglia d'Oro) for $700,000 at the Keeneland September Yearling Sale. Clay was the leading buyer of the Midlantic May sale, purchasing 12 head for a total of $5,545,000. Among his other purchases was Hip 162, a colt by Nyquist, whom he bought for $700,000. The Ontario-bred colt is a half brother to the multiple graded stakes-placed filly Luv Your Neighbor. The highest-priced filly Clay purchased was Hip 132, a daughter of Constitution. Hip 132 is out of the stakes-winning Medaglia d'Oro mare Contributing. Change is Good Clay said he liked the new format changes Fasig-Tipton implemented for this year's sale. "It was an enjoyable experience going through these horses and trying to pick out ones we thought were good athletes going over the dirt," Clay said. "It changes the strategy a little bit, because it's an unofficial timed breeze show, … but not in a bad way. There were quite a few good pedigrees in this catalog, so that made the list a little bit bigger to start with."