Blackkout, the standout 2-year-old stallion and performance prospect by $6-million sire Winners Version out of Jane Melby’s NFR mare RC Back In Black broke the Pink Buckle Select Sale record, selling to Victory Farms for $875,000.
Consigned by Solo Select and the Relentless Remuda, the colt has been in training with the Remuda’s 26-time World Champion Trevor Brazile and futurity trainer Miles Baker.
“This horse has all the tools to have an industry-shaping future,” Brazile said. “I’m still a little raw from having to part with him, but Victory Farms has consistently put their horses in the best hands and set them up for success, and I’m happy we could be just a part of this horse’s career.”
Victory Farms’ Danny Ray came to the Pink Buckle Select Sale to sell 10 head of horses himself, but when the chance came to buy Blackkout, he had to try his luck.
“Everybody knew I was getting out of the business, selling out, retiring,” Ray said. “I had sold down to 20 mares, and I got up here, and the fever got back on me again. A couple people challenged me again, and [Pink Buckle partner] Chad Beus is who convinced me. He said he wanted me back in the program. I said, ‘How am I going to get a Pink Buckle slot?’”
Beus told Ray that there were two in the sale—one selling with an Epic Leader colt, and one with Blackkout.
“I was a bidder on the gray,” Ray said. “But I loved that black horse. I watched him demo, and he’s a freak of nature. He moves so catty, with his front feet flipping out in front of him. I live on the edge all the time anyway, but I think I fell off it this time.”
“If Mr. Ray liked him today, he’ll be beyond pleased when he gets him home,” Baker added. “That horse has been so good from day one, and he was a little starstruck when he got into the Lazy E. What we saw today was 20% of his ability, and I can’t wait for them to feel what this horse is all about.”
Blackkout will head back to Victory Farms in Ada, Oklahoma, where he’ll start to work in the barrel pen, presumably with Kelsey Treharne, who jockeys for Ray.
“As long as Kelsey gets along with him and likes him, she’ll get the first shot at him,” Ray said. “She’s been loyal to me, and we really get along. She’s my No.1 girl.”
The stallion, raised by BryAnna Haluptzok, will stand at Beus’s Red River Equine in Thackerville, Oklahoma, in 2024, and Ray is already looking forward to crossing him on VF’s standout mares Chase This Ivory and Wheely Quick. For Ray, the allure of adding such an outcross trained by two of the best horsemen in the Western performance industry is icing on the cake.
“He’s a total, 100% outcross to all the Dash Ta Fames, Sun Frosts and Firewater Flits,” Ray explained. “The fact that he came from such a program, that added to the hoopla. They’re so professional. Trevor was very, very kind. They’re all so professional. So, we’re excited to have them come out of there.”
For Solo Select’s Melanie Smith, this stallion is confirmation of what she’s built her entire business around.
“Our slogan is The Very Best for a reason,” Smith said. “And that starts with the very best maternal lines. Maternal lines—loaded with the black-type that RC Back In Black has—paired strategically with great stallions—are what will continue to drive this industry in the right direction.”
