Yearlings

LIGHTNING struck at 2 p.m. Aug. 7, igniting two fires that eventually consumed 137,600 acres of the 300,000-acre Padlock Ranch in central-western Wyoming. It took 11 days before the fire was declared 100 percent contained. On Day 8 of the fire, Dava Bleak wrote an e-mail describing the view from the porch of her parents' home: "My home is burning - not my house - but my home, the land I have watched and treasured since my birth. We cheered when the fire went around a huge old pine tree that is wedged between two rocks and it didn't burn.

Big prices for little horses.That's how the trade magazines characterized the explosion in the thoroughbred weanling market at the recently concluded Keeneland (Ky.) sales, where prices for foals, just weaned from their mothers, jumped 25.9 percent from a year ago.Local breeders Carolyn and Ron Green from Westminster cashed in on the bonanza, selling a 9-month-old Maryland-bred filly for $280,000.Making that kind of score is almost the equivalent of winning a Grade I stakes and is the biggest payday the Greens have experienced in 25 years in the horse business.

Karen Hay struck out seven, allowed just five hits, walked one, hit another batter and threw three wild pitches in seven innings' work in the opener of the Amateur Softball Association Junior Olympic Fastpitch tournament.Her counterpart, Jen Holsinger, walked seven, struck out five and yielded three wild pitches in seven innings last night at Columbia's Cedar Lane Park.Guess who got the win?Hay's Tangerine Machine, one of three Anne Arundel-based teams competing in the 18-and-under tournament, made mistakes at the worst possible moments, allowing Holsinger's Columbus (Ohio)

Representatives of the Maryland horse industry and the state Department of Agriculture left last week on a 12-day trip to Russia. The primary goal was to secure Russian buyers for Maryland horses. The Marylanders hope that Russians will attend the Fasig-Tipton Midlantic yearling sale Oct. 1-3 at Timonium to buy thoroughbreds for upgrading their racing and breeding operations. That could begin a relationship in which Russians buy Maryland thoroughbreds and standardbreds and even veterinary medicine and feed, and Marylanders perhaps buy Russian show horses.

The Maryland Million is seven weeks away, but it has snagged its first big star.Samantha Siegel confirmed from Del Mar, Calif., on Friday that Urbane, the Grade I-winning filly that has provided pro tem champion Serena's Song with some of her stiffest competition, is heading east.Siegel, who owns the daughter of Citidancer, along with her parents, Jan and Mace Siegel, said the horse is skipping the Oct. 28 Breeders' Cup in favor of the Oct. 14 Maryland Million at Laurel Park.When the horse comes to Maryland, Siegel hopes either Chris McCarron or Kent Desormeaux will come along to ride.

LAUREL -- Peter Pugh pulls on his red baseball cap with the blue lettering that spells "Calumet Farm," and hops into his pickup truck."You wanna know what really makes me mad? People that dump this farm," the 39-year-old trainer said."I hear it all the time -- 'hey, have you got paid yet?' -- stuff like that. They would be so lucky to have even one son of Alydar standing in their shedrow."The litany goes on, ever since the world-renowned farm, the farm that is synonymous in this country with horse racing and Kentucky bluegrass, filed for bankruptcy on July 11.A week earlier Pugh shipped into Laurel with the bulk of what is left of the Calumet Farm racing string -- 10 horses, including two sons of Alydar, named Joy Maker and Aly Fresco; Beautiful Gold, a daughter of champion sire Mr. Prospector out of Calumet's champion filly, Before Dawn, and seven other royally-bred, though heavily leveraged, horses.

They likely won't recognize each other Saturday as they go to the gate for the 138th Preakness. Orb, the Kentucky Derby winner, and Departing, a horse some believe could be the only one capable of ending this year's Triple Crown chase in Baltimore, will be thinking of nothing but running. They will be two of nine horses trying to get to the front. Before they ever officially became racehorses, they were just two of eight horses in a field on the Kentucky farm where they were born.

Buyers hoping for another Urbane or Smoke Glacken paid $5,090,700 for 368 thoroughbreds at the annual two-day Fasig-Tipton Midlantic Eastern Fall Yearling Sale that concluded yesterday at Timonium.This was the first time at a yearling sale in Maryland that the $5 million mark was surpassed. Four yearlings sold for more than $100,000 each.In the regular session late Monday and yesterday, 226 yearlings sold for $1,492,100 -- an average of $6,602, compared to $5,861 at last fall's sale. In the selected session Monday, 142 yearlings sold for $3,598,600 -- an average of $25,342, compared to last fall's $23,674.

Records tumbled like autumn leaves at the two-day fall sale of yearlings that concluded last night at the Maryland state fairgrounds in Timonium.More yearlings than ever changed hands. One yearling drew a record bid. Buyers spent more. And the average price per yearling was higher than ever."It was certainly the strongest yearling sale there's ever been in Maryland," said Mason Grasty, executive vice president of Fasig-Tipton Midlantic, which conducted the auction.During the two-day sale, 456 horses were sold for $7,702,800 -- an average of $16,892.

Melissa Ann Tokarz remembers the filly in the auction ring last December at Timonium. "She had a lot of presence, a very sharp look in her eye," Tokarz said. "She bounced around the walking ring like she thought she was somebody." She was. The chestnut filly by Eastover Court out of Beware of the Ace was judged grand champion last Sunday at the 2000 Maryland Horse Breeders Association's yearling show at the state fairgrounds. Bobby Frankel, the Hall of Fame trainer, considered 108 Maryland-bred yearlings before settling on the lively chestnut.