LEXINGTON, Ky. (ABC36 NEWS NOW) – It is the largest thoroughbred yearling sale in the world and it is held right in Lexington’s backyard at Keeneland. During the September Yearling Sale thousands of people across the U.S. and more than 50 different countries will come out to buy a horse. “We have people with multi-million dollar credit lines here with us…
LEXINGTON, Ky. (ABC36 NEWS NOW) – It is the largest thoroughbred yearling sale in the world and it is held right in Lexington’s backyard at Keeneland.
During the September Yearling Sale thousands of people across the U.S. and more than 50 different countries will come out to buy a horse.
“We have people with multi-million dollar credit lines here with us and haven’t been able to buy a horse yet,” said Tony Lacy, the Vice President of Sales at Keeneland. “In the first day we had the top 21 sellers were all bought by 20 different buyers. There is nowhere in the world where that would happen.”
The sale began on Monday, where 14 horses were sold for a million dollars each.
On Tuesday, one colt was sold for $5 million. Making it the highest price paid for a colt since 2006, where Meydan City sold for $11.7 million.
Lacy says this is their biggest crowd in years.
“I’ve not seen an energy like this around here in a long, long time,” said Lacy. “I think we were equating to some of the excitement and the energy from the 1980’s. It was incredible.”
As of Wednesday, 34 yearlings were bought for one million dollars or more, which is the highest since 2005.
James Shannon, who owns race horses in Pennsylvania, came to the sale for the first time.
“It’s been beautiful really,” said Shannon. “It’s exciting to hear the auction inside and the different people bidding. We’ve followed the book and wrote down what each horse would cost, so it’s been great. We’ve bought a horse with Ken McPeek, who would be the trainer.”
With so much money going into the sales of the horses, Keeneland expects to make around $400 million in gross sales by the end of the event.
Lacy says that not only is this sale huge for the industry, but also has an impact on the local economy.
“This is a direct result where people from outside of our state and outside of the country even are investing in our state,” said Lacy. “So, it’s a lot of inward investment into Lexington and into Central Kentucky. That’s generating tax dollars, it’s generating employment.”
The sale is open to the public, so anyone can go and enjoy the horses. It ends on September 21.