TEPIN, the second dual Eclipse Award winner offered Monday night at the Fasig-Tipton November Sale, was gaveled down to Coolmore’s M.V. Magnier for $8 million and will head to Ireland, where she’ll reportedly be bred to Galileo.
Going through the ring as Hip No. 130, Tepin’s sale came moments after Songbird, another two-time champion, brought a sale-high $9.5 million. The likely future Hall of Famers were the marquee offerings at the one-day auction.
Consigned by ELITE Sales, agent for owner Bob Masterson, Tepin was officially retired in the spring and was mated on May 1 to two-time Horse of the Year Curlin, whose foal she’s carrying.
Although she ended her career with two defeats, Tepin established herself as a turf miler of world stature, not only beating males in the Breeders’ Cup Mile (G1) and in the Woodbine Mile (G1) in Canada, but in the prestigious Queen Anne (G1) at Royal Ascot in 2016. Those three were among 11 career stakes won by Tepin, six of them Grade/Group 1.
Beginning her career on dirt, the daughter of Bernstein won two of her first five starts on the surface, including the 2013 Delta Downs Princess (G3). However, three of her final four starts at age three were on turf, with her best placing being a second in the San Clemente H. (G2).
Tepin came into her own at age four in 2015. After an allowance victory, she registered back-to-back scores in the Churchill Distaff Turf Mile (G2) and Just a Game (G1). Photo-finish losses in the Diana (G1) and Ballston Spa (G2) followed, but she concluded her first championship season with victories in the First Lady (G1) by seven lengths and the Breeders’ Cup Mile by 2 1/4 lengths, both at Keeneland.
What would become an eight-race win streak continued into 2016 with victories in the Endeavour (G3), Hillsborough (G2), Jenny Wiley (G1), and a repeat score in the Churchill Distaff Turf Mile. Then followed her half-length score in the Queen Anne, over a straight mile on soft ground. Three months later, she grinded out another win against the males in the one-turn Woodbine Mile.
A surprise second in her title defense of the First Lady, Tepin just missed repeating in the 2016 Breeders’ Cup Mile at Santa Anita, finishing second to Tourist by a half-length.
Trained throughout her career by Mark Casse, Tepin retired with a mark of 23-13-5-1, $4,433,358. She’s out of the Stravinsky mare Life Happened, also the dam of multiple Grade 2 winner Vyjack.
