Ballyrankin Stud

3604 Georgetown Road
Lexington, KY 40511

mailing address: PO Box 12496
Lexington, KY 40583

Horse vans should use the farm entrance at:
1641 Berea Road, Lexington, KY 40511

STAKES WINNERS and More FROM BALLYRANKIN STUD

Cogburn Dazzles Again in Turf Sprint, Will Head to BC Turf Sprint
by Marcus Hersh DRF.com

FRANKLIN, KY (September 7, 2024)-The Count Fleet Sprint in April of 2023 at Oaklawn Park did not feel like a bright spot in the career of a horse named Cogburn. Held in high regard by trainer Steve Asmussen, who thought he was training a top dirt sprinter, Cogburn finished a flat seventh in that Count Fleet, his second straight subpar showing. But if not for that low point, Cogburn never would have hit his peak. Six weeks later, Asmussen tried Cogburn on grass.

"He was good on dirt, but now he's dang near unbeatable on turf," Asmussen said, standing in golden hour light at Kentucky Downs shortly after Cogburn had crushed a strong field in Saturday's Grade 2 Turf Sprint.

"Dang near unbeatable" might be underselling the horse.

Cogburn came into Saturday's race with five wins -all stakes- from six grass starts, his lone defeat since the career-defining surface switch a close fifth in this race a year ago. Some wondered if Cogburn could produce his best over this undulating, irregularly shaped racecourse. That's no longer in question.

Cogburn broke awkwardly here a year ago but departed cleanly Saturday under Irad Ortiz Jr., and before a half-furlong had been run, he blasted to a clear early lead. No one ever came near him. Ortiz didn't appear to come close to getting to the bottom of his mount, yet Cogburn still came home 3 1/4 lengths better than runner-up Khaadem, a multiple Group 1-winning sprinter in England. He ran six furlongs over a firm, fast-playing course in 1:07.68 and paid $4.20 to win.

History will be left to ponder how a horse this fast, this good, clearly the best turf sprinter in North America, was not an odds-on favorite today.

"We went to the turf, and that's who we always thought he was," said Asmussen, who trains Cogburn for Clark Brewster and William and Corrinne Heiligbrodt.

The Turf Sprint was worth $1,797,200, and Cogburn took home $1,176,600 of it, his bankroll now approaching $2.5 million. Axthelm rallied from 11th to finish third, a nose in front of Nobals, who won the 2023 Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint.

The Turf Sprint is part of the Breeders' Cup Challenge Series, though Cogburn already had a victory in a Win and You're In race, the Grade 1 Jaipur at Saratoga. And yes, he's going to the Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint at Del Mar.

"That'll be his next start," Asmussen said.

Cogurn hadn't started since the Jaipur on June 8, Asmussen hewing to a lighter schedule this year, saying he over-raced the horse during 2023. Cogburn didn't break in his 2023 races like he has been this season, an awkward start part of the reason he was defeated three-quarters of a length here a year ago. Asmussen said fewer trips to the post have produced a better gate horse.

"I was overdoing it. I showed my frustration with him not running up to par with running him too much," he said.

Cogburn not only was the fastest horse in the early part of the Turf Sprint, he nearly was the fastest at the end of it. Widening a lead that had been 2 1/2 lengths at the stretch call, Cogburn's final furlong in 12.20 was eclipsed only by Khaadem and Axthelm.

Khaadem, a fast-ground lover who has won the last two renewals of the Group 1 Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes at Royal Ascot, broke poorly and was last into the bend, the first turn he'd raced around in several years. He finished strongly between horses and might have earned another trip to America this fall for the BC Turf Sprint.

"First time over here, things a little bit new to him, a little awkward away, found himself out the back, and he finished lovely, so we're really pleased with him," said England-based trainer Charlie Hills.

Cogburn's win in the Troy two Augusts ago at Saratoga, his first graded-turf stakes score, came over a rain-soaked course. In May, he won the Turf Sprint at Churchill by 2 1/2 lengths on boggy going. But in the Jaipur, he set a North American record for 5 1/2 furlongs while running on firm, fast ground. And even Kentucky Downs, like no other track in North America, could not blunt the brilliance of Cogburn, a son of Not This Time and In a Jif, by Saintly Look.

Cogburn has never been to California. They won't beat him there, either, if he brings his New York and Kentucky turf races with him.

Cogburn's Dam a Welcome Surprise to Lockharts

by Chris McGrath
Thoroughbred Daily News
It's the surprises that keep us interested in pedigrees, and that applies as much to people as to horses.

Jimmie and Sally Lockhart | Katie Lockhart

Cogburn, who recently sprinted to a world record in the GI Jaipur Stakes, is out of a mare by Saintly Look. Saintly Who? A son of Saint Ballado, and winner of the GIII Lecomte Stakes in 2003, Saintly Look covered a couple of small books in Indiana, in 2008 and 2009, and was then sold for $17,500 at the Keeneland November Sale. Cogburn's dam In a Jif was among nine named foals in his second crop. Eventually resurfacing at another farm in the state, Saintly Look seems to have had three named foals in 2014, another eight in 2015, and then disappeared from production altogether.

"Saintly Look!" exclaimed Sally Lockhart's husband Jimmie when she brought the mare home. "Saintly Look doesn't belong in our broodmare band!"

"I didn't know who the hell Saintly Look was," admits Sally, looking back. "I'd love to tell you that we'd spent days researching In a Jif, but it wouldn't be true. I just saw this pretty mare walking up through the chute and when I looked at the catalogue page, she was in foal to Not This Time. And at the time, I just had an infatuation with that horse.

At the start of the year, indeed, she had been proud that their Ballyrankin Farm had been the very first to deliver a foal by Not This Time. And now that his second crop was imminent, she was stretching to sweep up unwanted seasons at a bargain rate.

"But that's how we've made our money,@ she explains. "That's been our livelihood, breeding nice-looking mares to cheaper horses. We can't afford expensive mares, so we try and buy ones that might have nice foals. That's the only way we can do it--and one of ours had the highest-priced Known Agenda last year, another the highest Modernist."

It so happened that this pretty mare was being sold through James Keogh, with whom the Lockharts have a relationship going back over 20 years.

"In fact, I think it's fair to say that if James hadn't helped me out with boarders, we wouldn't even have the farm now," Sally acknowledges.

They know him as few others. They even know a scruffy, sweating Keogh, who toils towards the immaculate presentation both of his horses and his own wardrobe, on sales day. And they know the horseman so respected that a couple of years ago, he judged at the Dublin Horse Show.

And there he was, watching this mare on the rostrum, scowling.

"James had a horrible face on him while she was up there," Sally says with a chuckle. "So I walked up and said, 'What's wrong with her? Why isn't she making anything?' And he said, 'There's nothing wrong with her. I don't know why she's not bringing more.'

So Sally just went right ahead and bought the mare for $26,000. After all, In a Jif had won seven of 18 starts, including a sprint stakes on the Turfway synthetic. Even before she had the docket in her hands, however, Sally was already worrying about what Jimmie was going to say.

"I thought, I'm going to be in so much trouble," she recalls. "So I signed in some fake name. And I wasn't even at the vanning desk before Jimmie called me. And he was like, 'What the hell!? Did you just buy a mare?' And I looked around to see who had ratted me out."

"Nobody," confirms Jimmie. "I just recognized the fake name."

Of course he did. Because if you think Cogburn's dam has a surprising sire, then how about the woman who found her? For when Sally signed the docket in the name of Bellary Bay Bloodstock, she was borrowing the title of a novel by her father John Brennan.

Never heard of him, maybe? A bit like Saintly Look? Except he's on many a bookshelf, especially back in Europe, under the nom de plume of John Welcome. Besides his occasional collaborations with Dick Francis, he wrote old-school thrillers, plus biographies of Fred Archer and, in the classic Neck Or Nothing, Sceptre's trainer Robert Sievier.

"He was a lawyer in Wexford, but always wrote books on the side," Sally explains. "And he dedicated the one called Bellary Bay to me. It was about World War I in Kerry, where he had a house. He always wrote under a pseudonym because he thought that if anybody knew who was writing these books, he couldn't be a very good attorney. So he wanted to stay under the radar."

But it was an incidental benefit of her upbringing by this remarkable man that ultimately determined the course of Sally's life.

"We always had animals at home," she says. "I mean, we had 40 acres, and always had hunt horses, event horses, cattle, chickens. My sisters and I, we all rode growing up: Pony Club, hunting, all that sort of stuff."

Their own place was called Hermitage and, by the time Sally was naming a Kentucky farm, that name was already taken! But one of her favorite Pony Club events as a child was held at a place called Ballyrankin, and it is the old Irish road-sign that hangs on their gate today.

There was a long and winding road to be followed first, of course. And probably things would never have played out the way they did but for the eventing fall in which the 18-year-old Sally injured her back. Told that she couldn't ride for six months, she went to muck stalls at Coolmore for a breeding season-and liked it so much that she returned the following year.

"I would have stayed riding event horses in Ireland, if I hadn't hurt my back," she says. "But when Coolmore sent me over here, I just never went home. Life was good, I was making a bit of money, it was all a lark."

For many years she worked in the office at Brookdale, right through the days of Deputy Minister, Silver Deputy and Forest Wildcat. In the meantime, she met Jimmie, who was running one of the broodmare barns at Airdrie. Later he spent three years at Ballindaggin Farm for John Williams, and also did a stint at Stonereath. But around the turn of the century, the Lockharts decided they had enough experience to start a place of their own. They leased a couple of other sites, before settling where they are now on the Georgetown Road.

"We own bits and pieces of 20 mares, and we're a commercial breeder," Jimmie sums up. "Our plan is to have early foals that are strong and mature for November. That's our big sale."

Keeneland November was duly on the agenda for the Not This Time foal delivered by In a Jif. And albeit Sally's own attempt to remain incognito had entirely failed with her husband, they maintained the "fiction" when the mare duly foaled the following March, registering the breeder as Bellary Bloodstock.

"I was so nervous until she had a colt," Sally confesses. "But then I thought, 'Thank God, I'm off the hook.' That was just lucky, of course. But he was a really straightforward, easy keeper. And the mare the same: pleasant, sensible. I wish we could tell you we saw a champion coming. But there was nothing fancy about him.

"It's like Old Tom Cooper used to say. He was a friend of my father, and took me under his wing when I first came over here. 'Sally,' he told me. 'You just need to look them in the eye. That's really all you need to do, figure out what's going on in their head.' Stands to reason, doesn't it?"

Naturally selling through Keogh, the colt brought $52,000 from Clarmont Bloodstock before a topsy-turvy pinhook cycle. Ultimately, he ended up racing for a partnership of Clark Brewster with Corinne and William Heiligbrodt, who sent him into training with Steve Asmussen. As a juvenile, Cogburn impressed in a Churchill maiden just a couple of days before In a Jif's next foal, a Classic Empire filly, surfaced deep in the September sale and made $110,000. She, too, won a Churchill maiden the following June-by which time Cogburn had just finished second on his graded stakes debut.

"And Taylor Made came knocking on the door," Sally says. "I mean, she was empty, and we weren't going to be able to afford to breed her back to Not This Time. So we agreed to a private sale."

Obviously the price would be higher still, now that Cogburn has proved a revelation for the switch to turf. But the Lockharts' business is one that demands pragmatism, and a hunch won't always pay off the way it did with Not This Time.

"We have sometimes fallen victim to fashion," Jimmie says. "Sometimes it can come back and bite you when you're in the wrong year. Stallions used to get two or three years, but now it's almost down to one cycle. Things have become very, very fashion-driven."

Their three principal clients have usefully contrasting agendas: one joins them in selling weanlings at the November sale; another breeds strictly to race; another operates in between. On the whole, however, the Lockharts find that the same treatment benefits all young stock the same.

"Except that the clients who breed to race don't believe in corrective surgeries," Jimmie notes. "Their horses are not manipulated. Other than that, we raise them all pretty much the same-they're wintered the same, housed the same-until the sale horses, at the appropriate time, go into their prep. The breeding to race, of course, gives you the luxury of breeding to whatever horse you want. But that's a long game, and an expensive one."

The Lockharts believe sufficiently in their groundwork to have done well buying back fillies raised at Ballyrankin, off the racetrack, to breed. But they will also keep monitoring lesser fillies, to reserve them a home if in any way uncomfortable with where they have ended up.

The compassion remains, then, however tough the environment can sometimes be. Sally was one of the first women to join the Irish diaspora in the Bluegrass.

"The business was definitely male dominated in those days, though I'm not sure I ever really noticed," she says. "I mean, it still is, or when you stop and think about. Maybe it was harder, as an employer, to get staff that respect you in this line of business. But I think that just takes time."

Certainly she felt no sentimental disappointment when both their children embarked on different careers. It's a tough vocation, after all, especially in the foaling season when Sally and Jimmie take alternate nights on call.

"We foal out 50 to 60 every year," Sally says. "I do enjoy that side. Obviously there's the tough ones that go wrong, and those wear on you. But those mares are my friends, and that's how I treat them. They work hard for you in that foaling barn. But I think the magic lasts longer for me than for Jimmie!"

"I won't lie," he concurs. "It's magical in January, but come May, it's torture. I'm ready for it to be over."

Both, however, share the sense of fulfilment when horses graduate from their program to excel on the track.

"We've had plenty of good racehorses come off the farm before this one," notes Jimmie. "Ollie's Candy (Candy Ride {Arg}) won a Grade I, and ran at the Breeders' Cup twice, and we'd raised her for Paul and Karen Eggert. Turnerloose (Nyquist) won the [GII] Rachel Alexandra. And years ago, we had Square Eddie (Smart Strike) that won the [GI] Breeders' Futurity at Keeneland and ran second at the Breeders' Cup."

The latter offered the Lockharts early reassurance that they knew what they were about, but will always particularly linger in Sally's memory as he kicked her in the head as a yearling. But even after cashing out the mare, nothing exceeds the pride the couple can justifiably take in having raised the four-legged lightning bolt who has already earned a place at WinStar on retirement.

"He's some kind of fast, isn't he?" says Sally. "Who would ever have thought? Maybe we won't ever get another Cogburn in our lifetime. But it was the right thing to do, to sell the mare at the time we did. And to have been riding on those coattails, it's nice."

And while she has found herself a long way from "the tang of turf smoke that hung all about their homesteads great or small"-as her father wrote of nostalgia for the old country-then here, also, is exactly what he described in Bellary Bay: "good country for horse-rearers, too, with its rich pastures set on limestone."

Home and away have transposed, by this stage, but the endeavor and the rewards remain the same.

"We're all just trying to make a living of it," Sally says with a shrug. "It's long days, sometimes long nights. But that's just the way it is. It's a way of life."

"And it's great when you feel you've accomplished something," adds Jimmie. "Even if part of it was by luck. Because if you don't believe in yourself, believe that you can make a difference, you're in the wrong line of work. So, yes, something like this does give you a sense of pride."

Ballyrankin Born and Raised Turnerloose Takes $75,000 Luther Burbank S

Santa Rosa, CA (August 3, 2024)-Turnerloose added another stakes win with a sharp victory in Saturday's $75,000 Luther Burbank Stakes for fillies and mares on the turf at Santa Rosa, Calif.

Sent off favored, Turnerloose ran a 1 1/16 miles in 1:43.97. She closed from third in a field of five under jockey Alexander Chavez to win by over 2 lengths.

Turnerloose, a 5-year-old mare by Nyquist, trained by Phil D'Amato races for the partnership of Abbondanza Racing, Medallion Racing and Ike and Dawn Thrash.

Turnerloose was trained by Brad Cox through 2022, a span of her career that included a win in the $500,000 Juvenile Fillies Stakes at Kentucky Downs in 2021 and a win in the G2 Rachel Alexandra Stakes at Fair Grounds. Additionally, she had a second in the G2 John Mabee Stakes at Del Mar last September.

Turnerloose has won 4 of 20 starts and earned $746,392.

Turf Sprinter Cogburn Sizzles in Record Time in G1 Jaipur
By Byron King Courtesy of BloodHorse.com

Bred, Born & Raised at Ballyrankin
Saratoga Springs, NY (June 8, 2024)-The Belmont Stakes Racing Festival acts like a mid-season Breeders' Cup, with nine grade 1 flat races featuring some of the best horses in North America.

And some of the fastest-one being Cogburn , who zipped to a 3 1/2-length victory in the Jaipur Stakes (G1T) at Saratoga Race Course with 5 1/2 furlongs in a record :59.80. According to Equibase, he clocked the fastest time ever at the distance in North America, whether on turf or dirt.

Carotari previously held the fastest 5 1/2-furlong record in North America in winning an allowance turf race at Saratoga in 1:00.21 in 2019.

Splits of Saturday's race by front-running Cogburn were similarly quick: :21.33, :43.07, and :54.

"Five and a half furlongs in under a minute," Asmussen noted. "That's not five-eighths; that's 5 1/2. That's basically a sixteenth of a mile faster than a fast horse."

He further relished winning the race for his respected clients, owners Clark Brewster and Corinne and Bill Heiligbrodt.

"What could be cooler than this?" he asked.

"So fast. I can't believe it," said winning rider Irad Ortiz Jr., who did not need to urge his mount over the final 70 yards.

Ortiz won the Jaipur for the third time after consecutive Jaipur victories aboard Disco Partner in 2017-18.

The race marked Cogburn's second graded stakes triumph in as many starts this year. On Kentucky Derby (G1) day at Churchill Downs, he won the Twin Spires Turf Sprint Stakes (G2T) by 2 1/4 lengths. He is now 5-for-6 on grass, a record that includes a victory in the 2023 Troy Stakes (G3T) at Saratoga.

In discussing long-term plans, Asmussen said he intends to run Cogburn in the $2 million Turf Sprint (G2T) at Kentucky Downs before the Nov. 2 Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint (G1T) at Del Mar, a race for which he earned an automatic paid berth with Saturday's victory. The Jaipur is a part of the Breeders' Cup Challenge Series: Win and You're In.

Favored among the field of 12 in the Jaipur, he paid $6.30 to win

"We were so proud of him at Churchill when he won the grade 2 sprint there and of course the Troy last year, but that was impressive. I mean, he just rolled down there," Brewster said.

Shakertown Stakes (G2T) winner Arzak rallied from 10th to grab second. Both 5-year-old Cogburn and 6-year-old Arzak are sons of Not This Time .

Arzak finished a neck ahead of Godolphin's overseas invader Star of Mystery , a 3-year-old filly taking on older males.

Bred in Kentucky by Bellary Bloodstock, Cogburn is out of the stakes-winning Saintly Look mare In a Jif . He was a $150,000 purchase by Brewster at the 2021 Ocala Breeders' Spring Sale of 2-Year-Olds in Training, where he was consigned by Pick View.

Not This Time, the eighth-leading sire in North America of 2023, again ranks among the leaders this year. He stands for $150,000 at Taylor Made Stallions near Nicholasville, Ky.

Not This Time's Cogburn Defies Layoff, Post In TwinSpires Turf Sprint
By Christina Bossinakis
Courtesy of the Thoroughbred Daily News

Horsephotos

Bred, Born & Raised at Ballyrankin
LOUISVILLE, KY-Sharp as a razor exiting the far gate, Clark Brewster and William and Corinne Heiligbrodt's Cogburn (Not This Time) wasted not time dusting off the cobwebs, coming home a 2 1/4-length winner in the GII Twin Spires Turf Sprint early on Saturday's Derby Day card.

Given an 8-1 chance will making his 2024 debut, the 5-year-old broke in front but allowed Coppola (Into Mischief) and Mo Stash (Mo Town) to show the way through a :22.61 opening quarter over a course labeled 'good'. Taking a slight edge from the outside coming out of the far turn, Cogburn lost some ground as Coppola cut the corner in front turning for home, but the Steve Asmussen trainee was clearly best on the day, drawing clear to score comfortably over Filo Di Arianna (Brz) (Drosselmeyer). Mischief Magic (Ire) (Exceed And Excel {Aus}) closed to grab third.

"He was sharp, [Asmussen] had him ready today," said winning rider Irad Ortiz Jr. "The way he broke, Steve told me he was ready. He was running so good, there was no stopping him."

Graded placed on the dirt, Cogburn took four of seven starts last season, highlighted by three consecutive wins when switching to the turf in Lone Star's Chamberlain Bridge S., Gulfstream Park Turf Sprint and the GIII Troy S. in Saratoga. Making one more start at four, he finished fifth in the GII Turf Sprint at Kentucky Downs Sept. 9 and was packed away for the remainder of the season.

"He has [found a home on turf]," said Asmussen. "Obviously, his turf races are beyond excellent and we're very fortunate to have him. That is typical of him [to break that well]. I was so concerned about the outside draw and he took care of that in one jump."

When asked if there were any concerns coming off a seven-month respite, the Hall of Fame trainer said, "We thought he was doing extremely well coming into the race, this was a very big race coming off the layoff. We were concerned when he drew the 14 hole, that's a lot to overcome. But his break cleared that problem. That's what he's capable of and that's what we'll be getting to campaign the rest of the year."

Pedigree Notes:
Cogburn is one of three foals out of In a Jif to race, and all three have found the winner's circle. He also has 4-year-old sister by Classic Empire named Empire of My Own and an unnamed 3-year-old sister by Tapiture. In a Jif produced a full-brother to Cogburn last term and was bred back to Epicenter.

Durante Born and Raised at Ballyrankin Stud Takes G3 Bold Ruler
Courtesy of ThoroughbredDailyNews.com

October 27, 2023 (Jamaica, NY)-Durante led past every pole to prove a decisive winner of Friday's GIII Bold Ruler S. at Aqueduct. Ridden positively by Manny Franco, the 6-5 chalk made the running well off the inside and covered the first couple of furlongs in a sharp :21.92. Closer to the fence for the run around the turn, Durante got the half-mile in :44.87 as they stacked up to his outside to take a crack at him, but he had more to give in the final furlong and was never in any sort of danger. High Oak outfinished Twisted Ride for second.

Durante made the first 18 starts of his career in California, eight for Doug O'Neill and the rest for Keith Craigmyle, good for three wins. He was given a soft introduction to racing on this side of the country with an easy allowance score at Penn National Aug. 2 ahead of an open lengths win at Saratoga 17 days later. He made it three in a row Sept. 16, scoring by five lengths over 6 1/2 panels and was just defeated by Cowan (Kantharos) when last seen just 13 days ago.

"A lot of these California horses enjoy the East Coast. There's no getting around that." said trainer David Jacobson. "I think it's a combination of the weather and the track. They seem to do well here and it just feels good to have a nice horse in my barn again."

Pedigree Notes:
Durante was bred by William Humphries & Altair Farms LLC in the Bluegrass. On the eve of the running of the GII Forty Niner S., it seems just that this son Distorted Humor would be represented by his 170th stakes winner globally and 74th graded/group winner worldwide. Out of an unraced half-sister to Gaff (Maria's Mon), a Grade III winner on turf and dirt, and SP Christina d'Oro (Medaglia d'Oro), Durante has a 2-year-old half brother named Wrightsville (Candy Ride {Arg}) that sold for $610,000 at the 2022 Keeneland September sale, a yearling half-brother by Twirling Candy and a weanling half-sister by Authentic. Seahawk Girl was most recently bred to Justify. Durante is a winner of $428,911 with a record of 23 starts, 7 wins and on the board a total of thirteen times.

Cogburn, a Ballyrankin Stud Born and Raised colt for Breeder Bellary Bloodstock, Upsets Caravel in Troy
(Saratoga Race Course August 5, 2023-read Blood-Horse article)

Turnerloose Upsets G2 Rachel Alexandra Stakes
(Fair Grounds Race Course February 19, 2022-(read Blood-Horse article)