Yearlings

During the first day of perhaps the largest fall sale of yearlings ever in Maryland, 222 horses changed hands for $3.5 million -- an average of $15,968 apiece."

Miss Piggy will never win a race. But Mary Bo Quoit might.Same horse.Miss Piggy, the Carroll County yearling whose progress is being chronicled in The Sun, has swapped her barnyard moniker for a permanent name -- the one she would take to the track.Call her Mary Bo Quoit now. The name is a marriage of pedigree: Her dam is Mary Bo Peep; her sire, Waquoit.The filly's name, one of more than 500 submitted by Sun readers, is simple and straightforward -- the way her Baltimore owner hopes she'll run."

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.

Prominent California horse owners Jan, Mace and Samantha Siegel bought the highest-priced yearling at yesterday's Fasig-Tipton Midlantic Eastern Fall Yearling Sale at the Timonium Sales Pavilion at the state fairgrounds.The Siegels paid $170,000 for a Kentucky-bred bay filly by Wild Again out of Sweetly Decorated, by Well Decorated. The filly was sold by Muirfield East as agent. At the 1993 fall yearling sale at Timonium, the Siegels paid $25,000 for their outstanding filly, the Maryland-bred Urbane, winner of more than $1 million and two Grade I stakes.

The deadline for nominating Maryland-sired foals for lifetime participation in Maryland Million racing events is tomorrow. For yearlings not previously nominated as weanlings, a fee of $600 is required. For yearlings whose provisional fee was paid in 1994, a final payment of $200 is due.Also, stallions must be nominated before each breeding season for the foals conceived in that season to be eligible. The stallion nomination fee due by tomorrow is equal to the advertised stud fee, with a $500 minimum.

Someone saw Samantha Siegel leave the horse sales pavilion at the Timonium Fairgrounds yesterday and said: "Quick, go get her. Don't let her leave."In about three hours, the Beverly Hills, Calif., horse owner and her parents, Jan and Mace Siegel, spent $527,000 for six thoroughbred yearlings, including $210,000 for the sales topper, a Maryland-bred bay colt.It was the highest price ever paid for a thoroughbred yearling at a Timonium auction and the third-highest ever for any age thoroughbred at the venue.

It's too early to tell if the late summer and fall meet at Pimlico Race Course will be curtailed next year, track president Joe De Francis said yesterday, after the track wound up its 1995 live racing season.The gross amount bet during the 42 days at Old Hilltop rose 4.7 percent over the similar August and September period last year. Track and horsemen's revenues each grew about $245,000.But the summer and fall dates at Pimlico still trail the other four seasonal meets at Pimlico and Laurel Park and there has been some discussion about dropping live racing at Pimlico during this period next year.

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.

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.

West By West. Sewickley. Compelling Sound. Becker and East Over Court.The names of these horses might not be household words, but each is a new Maryland stallion prospect that represents a firm commitment by breeders in the future of the state's thoroughbred industry.Maryland's breeding industry is spotlighted Saturday by the eighth running of the Maryland Million. It's a day that one horseman, local advertising executive David Hayden, said "means more to Maryland breeders than the Preakness."