Saturday Sires: Not This Time

How has your year gone? With the holidays approaching in earnest, it's not uncommon for American families to send a letter to loved ones sharing highlights from their year. If a stallion were to do that, Not This Time's letter might go something like this:

Dear Friends and Family,

It's been another great year! One son set the North American record on grass for 5 1/2 furlongs and has been billed as “the fastest horse in the world.” Another couldn't be beaten at marathons on the dirt. Yet another was the only winner of the 35 races carded at Royal Ascot to be sired by an American-based stallion. I'm firmly entrenched among the leading sires, covered my best book of mares yet, got another OBS seven-figure 2-year-old, had three yearlings sell for $1 million or more at Keeneland September, and saw another boost in my stud fee.

Looking forward to 2025!

Not This Time

Sure, that's silly, but it doesn't take away from the facts: Not This Time, who holds pride of place at Taylor Made Farm, is one of the top sires in North America. He has had yet another spectacular year, both on the track and in the sales ring. According to Travis White, stallion nomination manager at Taylor Made, Not This Time is one of the rare horses who has the Midas Touch as a sire.

“It just felt like every step of the way, things went well for him,” said White. “They sold well early on, they got in good hands. Everybody made money along the way, whether it be a breeder or a pinhooker or people that bought them to race. Every step of the way, he rewarded people.”

What is it specifically about Not This Time that makes him successful in so many facets?

“He produces those kind of physical horses that people want to have,” said White. “They might dream of winning the Kentucky Derby, and obviously it doesn't work out in a lot of cases, but with him you can try that route and, if it's not successful, you can pivot and do something else, maybe sprinting or even going to the turf. Horses like [champion turf male] Up to the Mark or even [GISW and record-setter] Cogburn are good examples.

“As we get further along in his stallion career, you're seeing versatility in his offspring, whether it be sprinting, going two turns, dirt, turf. He has recognizable graded 2-year-old stakes winners in the summer and then he stays in the news because he also has some of the older horses that have been around for a while. They're sound and they're versatile.”

Not This Time didn't necessarily start out as one of North America's elite stallions–he's earned his way there–but there were definitely expectations for his own abbreviated racing career. A homebred for Albaugh Family Stable after the operation sold his older half-brother, Liam's Map (Unbridled's Song), for $800,000 as a Keeneland September yearling to St. Elias Stables and then watched him go on to wins in the GI Breeders' Cup Dirt Mile and GI Woodward Stakes, he was sent to trainer Dale Romans. His first start as a 2-year-old in June at Churchill Downs gave him an education if not an on-the-board finish, and he came back to romp by 10 lengths in August at Ellis Park at a mile.

His GIII Iroquois Stakes at Churchill was spectacular. He hopped in the air at the start, recovered well, and drew off under a hand ride for an 8 3/4-length drubbing of his challengers. Favored in the 2016 GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile, Not This Time encountered trouble early before swinging wide and closing with a rush to just miss by a neck.

“He was an extremely talented racehorse,” said White. “What he was able to do in his short career showed he was an exceptional talent. He ran a great race in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile, pretty much ran a winning race, just didn't have the best trip. Even watching him breeze on the track, you could just kind of tell from the way he moved he was an exceptionally talented horse.”

A little more than two weeks after the Juvenile, Not This Time was retired to Taylor Made after suffering a soft tissue injury to his right front. The Albaughs retained half.

“[Taylor Made] bought half of the horse with the whole intention of syndicating him from the get-go. We sold off some of our shares to our customers along the way. The Albaugh family has been fantastic to work with. We've always had a good relationship with them, but I think it's even stronger now. It's just nice to see them stay with us the whole time and have this great success. The shareholders from the very beginning are another group of people that made money as well, another group who has been successful just by being a part of him.”

Not This Time kicked off his stud career in 2017 for $15,000 and took a cut down to $12,500 for his fourth year in 2020. While he didn't lead the freshman sire list that year–finishing third, missing second by pennies–he did co-lead the freshman table by black-type winners with three in that first crop. They included his $1.35-million OBS June 2-year-old topper Princess Noor, who was his first 'TDN Rising Star' as well as winner of the GI Del Mar Debutante Stakes and GII Chandelier Stakes. Not This Time was just warming up. It didn't hurt that he put good-looking foals on the ground who began developing into real runners on the racetrack.

“He's a very attractive horse,” said White. “He was born and raised here on the farm, so we knew the horse very well from the start. He's a very nice horse physically so that attracted a lot of breeders to him in his first year, a lot of very good commercial breeders who know how to raise and produce a good horse. That kind of helped get him off to a good start and his offspring were very well received.”

White said Not This Time stands around 16.1 1/2 or 16.2.

“He's got some stretch and height to him. He's just a beautifully conformed horse, a great profile from the side, a really good neck and shoulder, pretty head, good hind leg.

“He's in great health, very young,” added White. “We just try to keep him happy.”

Up to $40,000 for 2021 and $45,000 for 2022, Not This Time was elevated to the six-figure stratosphere in 2023, when he stood for $135,000 on the heels of his first champion, GI Travers Stakes winner Epicenter. His fee was raised again in 2024 ($150,000) when he added another champion in Up to the Mark. He'll stand for $175,000 in 2025.

“As the stud fee has increased a little bit every year, obviously the quality of mares has skyrocketed,” said White. “With the breeders that are sending mares to him, you're getting everybody that you'd want to be a part of your horse to help continue the momentum. They're all now breeding multiple mares to him. The nice thing is he's a very good breeding horse. He can breed a lot of mares, he's very fertile.”

Not This Time at Taylor Made | Sarah Andrew

Not This Time covered 191 mares this spring. White said he would be kept around that same number for the upcoming season.

“He had a lot of yearlings in the sale this year, but as we go down the road with these crops, some of these breeders are more breed to race. I'm looking forward to those horses–the Juddmontes the Shadwells. We've also got a lot more Japanese interest and European interest, so I think we'll start seeing more chance to really have an opportunity to explode internationally.”

The dark bay's yearlings averaged $345,992 in 2024 with a median of $250,000.

“Now he's got the pipeline, where commercially he's doing extremely well,” said White. “He's had just around 30 [yearlings] sell for $500,000 or more this year and that was off a $45,000 stud fee.

“I think he gives operations an outlet to produce a commercial yearling that will be received by Americans and Europeans. The book this year will be his best-ever book. We're getting more international appeal–whether it be Europe, Japan, Australia–we're getting support and seeing a little bit more international influence.”

Clearly the elite North American conduit to the late Giant's Causeway, Not This Time also has first Kentucky-based sons at stud. Epicenter is at Coolmore America and has his first weanlings this year, Up to the Mark is at Lane's End and will have his first foals in the spring, and Cogburn will stand his first season at WinStar in 2025.

At just 10, Not This Time's 39 black-type winners include 17 graded winners and six Grade I winners. His “name” horses in 2024 have included Cogburn, who won the GI Jaipur Stakes and two other graded events while flaunting spine-tingling speed; the lovely gray Next, whose seven-race winning streak at marathon distances included open-daylight victories by as many as 25 lengths; and the juvenile colt Shareholder, who won the G2 Norfolk Stakes at Royal Ascot. Both Cogburn and Next set new course or track records this year: Cogburn at 5 1/2 furlongs on Saratoga's grass in :59.80 and Next at 1 1/2 miles in 2:27.93 at Churchill Downs on dirt.

“To me, I haven't found any kinks in the armor just yet,” said White of the Taylor Made flagbearer. “They're sound, but they're still precocious. He's moving up the 2-year-old sire list–I think he's seventh right now–so he's up there. He's also up there on the turf list and the general sire list.”

White doesn't take Not This Time's success for granted.

“Every segment of this industry is extremely difficult,” he said. “I don't guess at the end of the day you really know which ones are going to hit, but you've got to have good people to breed the right kind of mares that know how to raise a good horse and they have to end up in good hands. It's a lot of luck along the way. We're very, very fortunate. We are blessed to have him and to be a part of him.”