Franklin could come down to which Ag Bullet shows up

If Ag Bullet at anything close to full strength shows up, the other seven entrants in the Franklin Stakes on Sunday at Keeneland run for second money.

If the Ag Bullet who showed up in August in Franklin, Ky., runs similarly on Sunday, she will not be winning the Grade 2, $400,000 Franklin, a 5 1/2-furlong turf dash for older fillies and mares.

Ag Bullet has won 8 of 19 starts, earned more than $3 million, won a Grade 1, lost the 2024 Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint by a neck, and finished second in last year’s renewal. Yet the key number with regard to Sunday’s contest might be “6.”

Ag Bullet is well into the second half of her 6-year-old campaign. Connections contemplated retiring her last year, and Ag Bullet apparently won’t race beyond 2026. In from California for trainer Richard Baltas, she could wind up in another Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint with a bounce-back race in the Franklin, but the fabulous mare also is cataloged in Fasig-Tipton’s November sale.

Concern over how much Ag Bullet has left in the tank arises from her most recent start, the Ladies Turf Sprint on Aug. 29 at Kentucky Downs. Ag Bullet is a Kentucky Downs horse. She won the Ladies Turf Sprint in 2024 in a brilliant romp, and got the job done by three-quarters of a length last year. But at a little over even-money in the Ladies Turf Sprint six weeks ago, Ag Bullet looked flat from the start and faded to eighth, the worst turf-sprint performance of her career.

It was hot at Kentucky Downs that day, temperatures rising to the high 80s, but nothing like the oppressive heat that descended on the track the following weekend. Maybe Ag Bullet wilted, and maybe it was just not her day. She returned to California and turned in three fast works for the Franklin and holds the key to the Franklin as the 2-1 morning-line favorite.

Who actually runs in the race might remain an open question until scratch time Sunday. Rail-drawn Usha has a strong dirt résumé but never has raced on turf. Dan Ward, assistant to trainer Bob Baffert, said that as of Thursday, the plan was for Usha to start, pending weather conditions.

Trainer Wesley Ward said he’d run both his entrants, Shoot It True and Kehoe Beach, were the Franklin to rain off turf, but if it stays on, Kehoe Beach probably is Ward’s lone starter. She might be enough.

Kehoe Beach also has thrived at Kentucky Downs, and it had been about 22 months since her last victory when she went wire to wire there Sept. 6 in a high-level allowance race. Like Ag Bullet, Kehoe Beach has excelled in long sprints and can get a mile in a pinch, but unlike Ag Bullet, she’s never even run in a turf race shorter than 6 1/2 furlongs.

“I don’t think it’s going to be a problem,” Ward said. “She’s fast. She bounces out of there. She has a lot of speed and is just a quality horse who carries that speed.”

Only longshot Itzel can match Kehoe Beach’s early foot, and even if Itzel proves quicker, Kehoe Beach can get a good pressing or stalking trip racing in the clear under Jose Ortiz.

Time to Dazzle needs all the pace help she can get and has gone on a six-race losing streak since rallying into a brutal early and middle tempo and winning the 2025 Franklin by open lengths. Time to Dazzle recently has come back into her best form for trainer Mark Casse and is a late-running threat under Irad Ortiz Jr.

Movin’ On Up, despite looking like a slightly lesser version of Time to Dazzle, is the shorter price, 6-1, to Time to Dazzle’s 8-1, on the track’s morning line.

If you can get a line on the current status of the wonderful, aging mare Ag Bullet, you might cash a bet in the Franklin on Sunday at Keeneland.