There are a number of reasons owners including horse racing partnerships acquire a racehorse through a 2 year old in training sale. You are able to view the horse breeze in an under-tack show to look at his or her stride which gives you a peak at the horses ability. You know you are getting a horse that’s proved it can hold up to training and conditioning. You also know you are also very close to getting that horse to the races. But the big question is how that horse ultimately performs in competition.
Research compiled by BloodHorse MarketWatch shows 78% of the 2-year-old’s sold at auctions from 2000-17 went on to start in a race and 76% of all of those runners became winners. By comparison, all of the named 2-year-old’s representing the same crops, and including the sale horses, 69% became runners and 67% of those runners became winners.
But what about the quality of the runners? Performance records show the sale horses have the edge here too. Among the horses sold from 2000-17 at North America 2-year-old auctions 6% became Black-Type winners and earned $66,976 on average. For all juveniles during the same period, 3.9% went on to become Black-Type winners and collectively averaged $49,218 in earnings.
Two-year-old’s in training sales started in Florida in the 1950’s as a way to sell horses with unfashionable or poor pedigrees. Over time, the 2-year-old’s in training sales morphed into their own market, driven largely by yearling to juvenile pinhookers who capitalized on the lucrative increase in value a horse can realize between when it’s a yearling to when it’s a budding racehorse.
Finding a quality, let alone stakes quality racehorse is always a challenge, but the 2-year-old’s in training market has proved to be a valuable shopping territory for many owners, including the Blinkers On horse racing partnership. Blinkers On found a filly by Congrats later named Turbulent Descent at the April OBS Two-Year-Old’s in training sale. Turbulent Descent went on to become a millionaire and was later sold for $3,000,000 as a racing/broodmare prospect.
Blinkers On Racing Stable Blog 