With the 2023 thoroughbred season nearing the quarter-pole at Hastings Racecourse there has been evidence of breeders, owners and trainers making the rounds with a renewed bounce in their steps.

Not quite a swagger. But clearly signs of confidence.

After the first 10 days encompassing 70 races at Hastings, horses bred in British Columbia have paraded to the winner’s circle on 43 occasions for a 61% winning percentage. On three of those dates BC-breds won six races on seven-race cards.

“It’s encouraging, no doubt about it,” says CTHS-BC president Dairen Edwards of Willow Creek Farms, crowned Leading Owner at Hastings Racecourse in 2021. “The early stats this year at Hastings can only help gain attention for our Yearling & Mixed Sale in August.”

The number of yearlings sold in 2022 totaled 57, resulting in gross sales of $983,100. This year’s Sale gets underway on Wednesday, August 30 at 3 p.m. (PT) at Thunderbird Show Park in Langley, BC. The Sale Preview is August 29, same time, same place.

Ten days into the ’23 Hastings’ season Willow Creek Farms was perched on the top rung of the Leading Owners ladder with five wins, including capturing the $50,000 Emerald Downs Stakes for fillies & mares three-years-old & up. Edwards’ five-year-old We B Three was a two-length winner for trainer Steve Henson and his assistant, son Robbie, with leading jockey Amadeo Perez in the irons.

Why the name We B Three? Edwards explains: “My wife Tia bought her at the 2019 Sale because she wanted to get the bidding started. She made the first bid of $1500 and nobody else bid so we got the horse. I gave her a good-natured hard time but her sisters, Nona and Jenna Marie, took her side. That’s when Tia decided to call the yearling, We B Three!”