Calumet, Legendary Stud Farm, Will Go On Auction Block

-- HORSE RACING

A treasured piece of thoroughbred-racing history, the elegant bluegrass home of eight Kentucky Derby winners and horses that won 2,500 races, will be sold to the highest bidder tomorrow as fabled Calumet Farm goes up for auction.

The result of the sale of Calumet's 850 hallowed acres, with its 14-room mansion, eight other residences and signature white barns with red trim, will provide a gauge of whether the thoroughbred industry is on track to emerge from a seven-year slump.

The sale of the Lexington, Ky., farm that produced legendary Triple Crown winners Whirlaway and Citation and prized stud Alydar, "is like selling the Hope Diamond or the Waldorf-Astoria hotel," said William Bone of the New York auction firm J.P. King Co.

Inquiries have been reported from as far afield as Sheik Hamdan Makhtoum of Dubai, the British royal family, media billionaire Ted Turner, "rap" music singer Hammer and the Sultan of Brunei.

Calumet's thoroughbreds fetched nearly $6 million at earlier auctions. The real estate and buildings are expected to sell for $15 million to $20 million. The property recently was appraised at $24.5 million.

-- GOLF

Field staff officials today called off - at least temporarily - a strike against the PGA Tour and its showcase Players Championship in Ponte Vedra, Fla.

The strike of the Professional Association of Golf Officials was scheduled to begin at midnight.

In a letter to deputy commissioner Tim Finchem, the officials' attorney, Richie Phillips, said the union's board of directors elected "to lift the midnight strike deadline" and offered to submit the dispute to binding arbitration.

-- BASKETBALL

Eldridge Recasner and Dion Brown, former Washington Huskies, were selected in the second round of the World Basketball League free-agent draft. Dayton chose Recasner and Jacksonville picked Brown. The league recently raised its 6-foot-5 height limit by 2 inches. Fourteen of the first 15 players drafted are 6-6.

-- SWIMMING

Germany's Sven Hackmann was suspended today for six months for using anabolic steroids, knocking him out of the Olympics.

Hackmann, a backstroke and freestyle specialist, took steroids after altitude training in Flagstaff, Ariz., the German Swimming Federation said. Hackmann denied he took a banned sustance to improve his swimming, saying he received injections to treat an arm injury suffered while playing racquetball.

-- SKIING

Diann Roffe-Steinrotter won the women's super-giant slalom today, the opening event of the U.S. alpine championships in Winter Park, Colo.

Roffe-Steinrotter, of Potsdam, N.Y., was timed in 1 minute, 10.33 seconds. That was nearly a half-second faster than runner-up Hilary Lindh, the Olympic downhill silver medalist from Juneau, Alaska.

Eva Twardokens of Santa Cruz, Calif., was third. The defending champion, Julie Parisien of Auburn, Maine, tied for fourth with her younger sister, Anna.

-- TENNIS

Sixth-seeded Amy Frazier defeated Camille Benjamin 4-6, 6-0, 6-1 and eighth-seeded Pam Shriver beat Stephanie Rehe 7-6 (8-6), 3-6, 7-5 in U.S. Women's Hardcourts first-round play in San Antonio, Texas.

OLYMPICS

The United States will enter its largest Olympic team ever when it sends 624 athletes to compete in official medal sports at 1992 Summer Games, according to William Hybl, USOC president.

-- BOXING

Heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield is suing his former manager, Ken Sanders, and business partner Herb Newton, alleging they conspired to cheat him out of as much as $4 million in a failed auto dealership in Fulton County, Ga.

-- FISHING

Fishery managers in Oregon and Washington agreed today to a Friday closure of recreational spring-chinook angling on the lower Columbia River. The season had been set to run through next Tuesday.

-- DEATHS

A high-school baseball player in Los Angeles pulled out a gun while riding the team bus and shot himself in the head in an apparent suicide, police said.

But Dorsey High School's baseball coach, Derrel Thomas, a former Los Angeles Dodgers outfielder, said the 17-year-old shortstop was playing Russian roulette when the .22-caliber pistol went off. School officials declined to release the boy's name.