Foundation Builders Presented By Keeneland: Leslie's Lady Was The Buy Of A Lifetime For Clarkland Farm
In the "Foundation Builders" series, we'll examine broodmares that became cornerstone producers for the breed, or just for their programs, after selling at the Keeneland November Breeding Stock Sale.
There are no formal standings for the greatest broodmare purchases in the history of the Keeneland November Breeding Stock Sale, but if there were, Leslie's Lady would be on the shortlist for the top spot.
There may be no more important broodmare to the shape of the North American Thoroughbred industry over the past two decades than Leslie's Lady, who gave us Into Mischief, a fixture at the top of the general sire list; champion Beholder, a Hall of Famer and arguably the best racemare of the 2010s; Breeders' Cup winner and popular sire Mendelssohn, and an army of black type producers and seven-figure auction horses.
For a horse that consequential, a $100,000 sale price feels almost comically discounted.
Like any great horse at auction, though, the Tricky Creek mare was available to everyone on the sales grounds, and the Lexington, Ky.-based Clarkland Farm was the one left standing on Hip 1208 at the 2006 Keeneland November sale.
At that point, Into Mischief (by Harlan's Holiday) was still a yearling, offering little to his dam's page besides proof of a live foal. When the catalog for the 2006 November sale was printed, she had two runners, and neither were winners. Louis the Bold (by Orientate) picked up a couple wins in Kentucky after the catalog was printed.
What she did have going for her was her race record.
Leslie's Lady was a stakes winner at two, taking the listed Hoosier Debutante Stakes at Hoosier Park, and she came back at three to finish second in the listed Martha Washington Stakes at Oaklawn Park and win an allowance race at Keeneland. She finished her career with five wins in 28 starts, earning $187,014 for owner James T. Hines.
Hines died suddenly in February 2006, and his equine stock was dispersed nine months later at the Keeneland sale.
Just weeks before Leslie's Lady went through the ring, the yearling Harlan's Holiday colt that would become Into Mischief sold for $80,000.
Though the mare's produce record was rather light at the time, Marty Buckner of Clarkland Farm said that she, along with her mother Nancy Mitchell and Fred Mitchell, saw plenty they liked.
"You always remember just standing there at the barn and looking at them," Buckner said about the big purchases. "So, I remember looking at her, and we had focused in on her because she had a few foals going for her already. She was 10 and in foal to Orientate (carrying a full sibling to Louis the Bold), so we kind of focus on she was stakes winner at two and had a few foals on the ground and one had already won a couple of races."
After securing the mare, the Clarkland operation foaled out the the Orientate filly she carried through the ring (who would become multiple graded black type producer Daisy Mason), and they bred Leslie's Lady to Rockport Harbor. The ensuing colt, named One World, went on to win a couple races, but by then, Into Mischief was teaching the breeders an extremely lucrative lesson.
"Within a year, Into Mischief had won the Grade 1 CashCall Futurity, so then, we started going to sons of Storm Cat," Buckner said.
They went back to Harlan's Holiday to produce Florida Holiday, an undersized full-brother to Into Mischief who went winless in six starts.
At that point point, the Clarkland team had a chance to cut their losses on Leslie's Lady and get out. Into Mischief had her stock as high as it had ever been up to that point, and commercial Thoroughbred breeders stay in the business by knowing when to take advantage of a timely update.
The decision to stick with Leslie's Lady would change the lives of everyone involved.
"She became a Grade 1 producer within a year of owning her, and my mom and Fred, they just always dreamed of owning a Grade 1 producer, so there was no way they were going to sell her," Buckner said. "Obviously, people, a lot of people, called to buy her. They'd had rough luck, but they were just never going to give up.
"We had a little bit of rough luck with the first few foals," Buckner continued. "And then, I remember we were looking at stallions and trying to decide who to breed Leslie to, and Mom goes, 'I'm going to Henny Hughes.' 'Why? We haven't even gone to look at him.' Those foals sold so well, he must be pretty and Leslie needs pretty.'
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Beholder
After that, it was game on.
The product of the meeting between Leslie's Lady and Henny Hughes was Beholder, who sold for $180,000 at the 2011 Keeneland September Yearling Sale. After that, Beholder embarked on a historic career that saw her earn four Eclipse Awards, win three Breeders' Cup races, and best the boys in the G1 Pacific Classic Stakes.
Beholder was inducted into the National Museum of Racing's Hall of Fame in 2022, and she has become the most famous member of the Spendthrift Farm broodmare band, producing Grade 1 winner Tamara and Grade 3 winner Teena Ella.
After Beholder's second Breeders' Cup Distaff victory in 2016, Leslie's Lady was voted Kentucky's Broodmare of the Year.
The commercial market started to wake up on Leslie's Lady from there. Her next foal, Curlin to Mischief (by Curlin) sold as a yearling for $300,000, and he became a competitive sire in California despite never making it to the racetrack.
Two years later, another Curlin filly, Leslie's Harmony, sold to Bridlewood Farm for $1.1 million. She went winless in two starts, but her son Scotland Yard was Saudi Arabia's champion miler of 2023.
Another two years passed, and the Clarkland Farm consignment had made itself comfortable in Book 1. In 2016, the farm offered Mendelssohn, a son of Storm Cat-line sire Storm Cat, and the Coolmore partnership dropped the hammer for $3 million.
Even at that sticker-shock price, it turned out to be a good buy for Coolmore. Mendelssohn earned $2.5 million on the racetrack, with victories in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf and the G2 U.A.E. Derby. With siblings Into Mischief and Beholder making an impact in the breeding shed and on the racetrack, Mendelssohn has consistently been one of North America's most popular stallions by number of mares bred since retiring to Coolmore's Ashford Stud in 2019.
Selling a horse for $3 million at a Keeneland sale is a bar that only a small handful of breeders will ever surpass. Selling one for $8.2 million or more is a club reserved for just 11 horses.
In 2019, Clarkland Farm offered America's Joy, a first-crop filly from Triple Crown winner American Pharoah at the Keeneland September sale - a filly by the most highly anticipated new sire in a generation, out of arguably the top broodmare in the country.
This time, it was Mandy Pope's Whisper Hill Farm landing the top bid, going to $8.2 million for America's Joy.
It was a historic transaction on several counts. The hammer price tied America's Joy for the 10th highest in the history of all Keeneland sales, regardless of age or event. She tied for the seventh-highest price commanded by a yearling at a Keeneland sale, and she is the highest-priced filly in the history of the Keeneland September sale, nearly doubling that of next-closest Moon's Whisper at $4.4 million from the 2000 sale. Sadly, America's Joy died in training at age three before she could make a start.
America's Joy was the final yearling out of Leslie's Lady sold at public auction, bringing her combined yearling revenues to a whopping $12.98 million. On the racetrack, her runners have earned a combined $9,632,513, while her sons and daughters have produced a countless amount of commerce at stud.
Clarkland Farm kept the final two foals out of Leslie's Lady, both fillies - Marr Time by Not This Time, and Lady Irene by Kantharos - to race as homebreds and keep for the broodmare band, with the hope of carrying on the success of the matriarch, who was pensioned in 2021 and died a year later.
