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REFLECTIONS I By Nelson Dunstan DunstanTop Top Flight Most Thrilling Race of Year They Will Meet Again in Vagrancy Cap Two Syndicates Want to Buy Alibhai Record Price of 50000 Is Offered OfferedNEW NEW YORK N Y June 10 10Threedot Threedot shorts Herman B Delmans promising filly Flower Bed winner of her only two starts at Garden State Park will be pointed for the juvenile filly stakes at Arlington Park Armed Phalanx and Cosmic Bomb three of the foremost name horses of the older ranks who are now on the sidelines will not be seen in action before late summer and it may develop that Cosmic Bomb will be out for the entire year The full Calu ¬ met string will be shipped to Chicago on Monday and Tuesday but Citation will be left in New York until Wednesday as Jimmy Jones says I always like to avoid shipping a horse as valuable as Citation until three or four days after he has raced Wil ¬ liam Helis is a doubtful consignor to the Saratoga Sales but will probably sell about 30 yearlings some time during the Atlantic City meeting Preface the first son of Reading II to go to the races won his first start in impres ¬ sive fashion at Hollywood Park recently On Monday Bel mont Park officials were giggling over the photo showing Mar ¬ shall Cassidy and Lou Walger at the Epsom Derby in gray top hats striped trousers and carrying walking sticks Francis Dunn cracked All they needed to complete the picture was clay pipes For the first time in 20 years Morven Stud the Virginia establishment of Whitney Stone will not be a consignor to the Saratoga Sales as they are retaining all their fillies for breeding purposes they will be back in the picture in 1949 1949The The Top Flight Handicap which was run at Belmont yesterday was the most thrilling contest seen on Long Island so far this year Honeymoon was the winner by a nose over Red Shoes and five lengths behind this pair of fiveyearolds came Gallorette the highweight of the field at 126 pounds Gallorette was badly blocked and in this writers opinion she should have been the winner If fillies and mares can run a race like the Top Flight they will be welcomed whenever they start against one another Unfortunately the group who raced in the Top Flight will not come together until July 10 when the 25000 Vagrancy Handicap at one and one sixteenth miles will be run at Aqueduct On the list of eligibles is Honeymoon Red Shoes and Gallorette who ran onetwothree in the Top Flight Also on the Vagrancy list is Harmonica But Why Not Snow Goose and still others who should make the race an even more interesting event than the Top Flight Gallorette will probably be the highweight in the Vagrancy also but lets hope she gets a better deal in the event to come than she did in the Top Flight FlightIn In recent days it has developed that two powerful syndicates are in the market for Louis B Mayers stallion Alibhai at the record price of 500000 The first syndicate which is comprised of breeders in Kentucky and the East now have six services still to sell of the 30 that will make up the syndicate At that price each one of the services would cost approximately 16500 Out in California however another syndicate has been formed by 20 breeders and they have only four services open of the 20 they plan We have it on the best authority that after consideration Louise B Mayer instructed his selling agent Ray Bell to close the deal with the Californians if they wanted the son of Hyperion Teresina to stay in the Golden State With a syndi ¬ cate of 20 each of those buying a share will have an interest of 25000 on the horse Out in the West they feel that if Alibhai makes his permanent home in their state it will be an incentive for their breeders to go into the market and buy top brood ¬ mares It is fully expected that the deal with one or the other of these groups will be closed within the next week or 10 days daysShould Should the sale of Alibhai be completed at 500000 it will be a worlds record price for a stallion The former record in this country was the 265000 that was paid for the Americanowned and bred Tracery The second high ¬ est price is the 200000 that Harry M Warner paid for the threeyearold colt Stepfather but who was still a horseintraining at the time of his sale The highest price ever paid in Europe was the 448000 which was paid to the Aga Khan for the stallion Stardust by a group of English breeders Just a few days prior to that sale the Aga Khans son Prince Aly Khan disposed of the stallion Tehran to another group of English breeders for 400000 the second highest price ever recorded in Europe With the coming sale of Alibhai Louis B Mayer is again very much in the news for it was the MGM chieftain who years ago offered a flat 1000000 to Samuel Riddle for Man o War There were many offers to Lord Derby of England for his famous stallion Hyperion the sire of Alibhai but it was these offers that brought Lord Derbys classic answer during the war Hyperion will not leave these shores even though England is reduced to ashes ashesIt It is very obvious that the yearling sales are not far off In this mornings mail came two very interesting booklets one from the Coldstream Stud of Dale Shaffer and the other from the Elmendorf Farm This writer will be leaving for Lexington on Monday and in the few short days he will be in Kentucky we hope to see many of the yearlings who next year will be making their bid for honors as twoyearolds Both Coldstream Stud and Elmendorf Farm have been among the top consignors to the sales for many years and this season they are offering the same high quality youngsters that have featured their ven dues for over a decade Elmendorf has a much more rounded out group than has been the case in former seasons for they have gone to outside stallions with many of their royallybred mares As a result they will have colts and fillies by War Admiral Whirlaway Count Fleet Mahmoud Bolingbroke Heli opolis Pensive and Jacopo to offer with the youngsters by Roman Unbreakable and Chance Shot We will be able to tell you more about these yearlings after we have been down in the Blue Grass for our annual visit
