Team Valor International occupied its familiar position at or near the top of the public partnership standings for the 2016 racing season, ranking second with seven stakes wins and tying for the premier spot with three Graded stakes tallies.
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John Box of Charlotte, North Carolina, came out on top of Team Valor's annual partner contest with the most accurate prediction of the stable's 2016 seasonal totals for wins and purse earnings. His prize is a free 5 percent interest in a Team Valor horse syndicated during 2017.
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Team Valor wrapped up a high-class chapter Wednesday in selling Grade 1 winner Euro Charline for a hair under seven figures at $978,000 to Japan's Northern Farm.
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Margaret Ransom has won the Stan Bergstein Writing Award for a story that revealed dire conditions for more than 40 horses at a Kentucky farm that led to animal cruelty charges against Chuck and Maria Borell.
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Hayabusa One made his U.S. debut over a solid group of horses look very easy at Keeneland on Sunday, and in the process he earned Rising Star status from the Thoroughbred Daily News and a Grade 1 assignment in early December. ... More
Multiple Grade/Group 2 winner Triple Threat, which raced in France and North America for his breeders Team Valor International and Gary Barber, has been retired from racing at age 6 ... More
English import Belvoir Bay continued to show her affinity for Southern California on October 1 when she collected her third stakes win over her last 4 starts, flying home best in the $78,000 Unzip Me Stakes on the hillside turf course at Santa Anita. ... More
Irwin bred Animal Kingdom in a Team Valor partnership, bought him back as a yearling at this same Keeneland September Yearling Sale and has analyzed several foals and yearlings by him. This filly is as good a representative from this first crop as I ve seen, he said, and in appearance she favors him greatly. ... More
Team Valor International has acquired a 50 percent interest in the 4-year-old Irish-bred colt Va Bank, who maintained his unbeaten certificate August 27 at Baden-Baden in winning the Group 3 Preis der Sparkassen Finanzgruppe over a mile and a quarter. The Archipenko colt s 12-race winning streak is believed to be the longest in the world. ... More
Keeneland September Yearling Sale purchase Speechify, a multiple stakes winner including the Grade 3 Mr. Prospector Handicap at Gulfstream Park, has been retired by Team Valor International after trainer Ralph Nicks suggested following his second-place finish Thursday at Gulfstream Park that the veteran sprinter might be protecting himself. ... More
Team Valor International has issued a Stan Bergstein Writing Award nomination for Natalie Voss s story on out-of-competition drug testing that was published on September 7 on the Paulick Report website. ... More
Belvoir Bay blazed a new dimension in her career and showed admirable courage on August 28 in a determined victory in the Grade 3 Torrey Pines Stakes at Del Mar, her dirt debut. ... More
Team Valor International reached a milestone over the weekend when Blossom d'Orange landed the 1,000th win for a partnership formed by Barry Irwin, scoring by 5 lengths in Saturday's Group 3 Produccion Nacional at Maronas in Uruguay. ... More
Homebred Blossom d Orange surprised her rider, her trainer and her owners by how effortlessly she dispatched 9 rivals Saturday to account for the Grade 3 Produccion Nacional by 5 lengths. ... More
Team Valor International s Euro Charline, which became the first 3-year-old to capture the Grade 1 Beverly D. Stakes at Arlington Park, has been retired from racing. An earner of $2,353,010, the Myboycharlie mare will be entered for the Tattersalls December Sale at Newmarket in trainer Marco Botti s Prestige Place consignment. ... More
Freshly syndicated Arles completed the first of two goals Barry Irwin set for her when he bought her this month in Europe by becoming a black-type winner last Sunday at Hannover Racecourse. The well-bred daughter of Champion European sire Monsun had placed four times in black-type races prior to syndication, including a Group 2, but she had never won a stakes race. ... More
The latest nominee for Team Valor's fifth annual Stan Bergstein Writing Award is a Paulick Report story on shadowy websites that peddle horse supplements touted as performance enhancing. ... More
Addae Do Jaguarete, which wrapped up her sprinting career in Brazil recently by trouncing males by 4 lengths in a 6-furlong Listed stakes on a sloppy dirt track, was fully syndicated by Team Valor International in an hour and 15 minutes. ... More
Euro Charline confirmed her place among the elite horses in the world on May 14 with her second-place finish against males in Newbury's Lockinge Stakes, the first Group 1 for older horses this season in England. The 5-year-old mare gamely followed up on her second-place finish to Japan s Real Steel in the $6-million Dubai Turf in March and has now won or placed in five races at the highest level. ... More
Team Valor International and Mrs. Gaynor Rupert have the probable favorite for the May 29 renewal of the lucrative Group 2 Oaks d Italia in the presence of Saturday s Listed trial winner Responsibleforlove. ... More
Team Valor International has nominated a story from the Paulick Report on the license status of trainer Marcus Vitali in Florida and Maryland for the $25,000 Stan Bergstein Writing Award. ... More
Team Valor International hosted near 100 racing partners last Friday, Saturday and Sunday at several venues in the bluegrass, where Briana Mott spearheaded a major team effort on the part of the company s staff to show off the stable and the region s assets. ... More
From South Africa s Sporting Post comes the following about Derby Innovator: The Making of Animal Kingdom, the memoir of Barry Irwin released this month. Here s to the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels. The trouble makers, the round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently." ... More
Euro Charline nearly pulled off a major upset as she fired a career-best on March 26 in finishing second by a diminishing half-length in the $6-million Dubai Turf on World Cup night at Meydan racecourse. ... More
Tuttipaesi was the first member of the Valor Ladies partnership, and she continues to exemplify the stable name as a lady of valor. The grey mare reached a new peak at age 6 on March 26 when she gamely knifed through traffic to get up approaching the wire in the Grade 2 Santa Ana States at Santa Anita.
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After traveling from the farthest reaches of the Thoroughbred world all the way back to the epicenter, Wide Range received another major boost today when Barry Irwin was able to nail down a nomination for her to be bred to Medaglia d Oro, the sire of her star half sister Songbird. ... More
From England's Racing Post: Team Valor is renowned for the international nature of its operation, but it has surpassed itself by sourcing a half-sister to exciting U. S. filly Songbird in Thailand. ... More
Trainer Robbie Sage warned that Madame Dubois would be short of her best for her first start of 2016 but her talent shone through in a game Grade 3 triumph under jockey Piere "Stryker" Strydom on February 7 in Johannesburg. She was racing for the first time for Team Valor and partners Valor Ladies, Anant and Vanashree Singh and Colin Bird. ... More
Barry Irwin and his Team Valor International will again honor excellent journalism in 2016 and have lined up a new slate of judges to decide the $25,000 Stan Bergstein Writing Award. ... More
After many teases, Mexikoma began to fulfill his potential on January 16 in a breakthrough triumph in the $250,000 Sunshine Millions Classic for Florida-breds at Gulfstream Park. ... More
Longtime racing partners Team Valor International and Gary Barber saw their English 2-year-old filly Belvoir Bay burst to the fore of her division with panache on Sunday at Santa Anita in the Blue Norther Stakes. Jockey Flavien Prat, returning from a severe back injury, did a masterful job settling the speedy import and cleverly made an early move curving off the final bend to open a clear advantage. ... More
Tuttipaesi may have added yet another extension to her racing career for Valor Ladies on December 12 when she soared to a fifth career stakes win in the $100,000 South Beach Stakes on the turf at Gulfstream Park. ... More
