A barn is just four walls and a roof … and maybe a hay loft.
But what happens to Barn 44 following the death of D. Wayne Lukas?
Piece by piece, the most legendary barn on the backside of the most legendary track in thoroughbred horse racing is quietly being emptied.
Barn 44 produced Kentucky Derby winners, Horses of the Year and, in many ways, Lukas ― the most prolific thoroughbred trainer. He stabled at Churchill Downs since 1989 until his death on June 28 at age 89.
Now, those four walls and a roof remain, but only a few horses are still stabled by Lukas’ estate.
First, some horses were sold in a sale. Many were moved to other trainers. Lemon Muffin, who ran in the 2024 Kentucky Oaks, is listed in an Ellis Park off-race, one that didn’t have enough horses to make the race card, for July 28. Her trainer is listed as Rodolphe Brisset.
Even Lukas’ Barn 83 at Saratoga was reassigned to Cherie DeVaux, a horse trainer and Saratoga Springs native.
Longtime Lukas-assistant Sebastian ‘Bas’ Nicholl took over the stable in a succession plan put in place by Lukas himself.
But in an interview on July 22 with industry publication Daily Racing Forum, and a decision known among trainers on the backside of Churchill Downs as part of the plan, Nicholl announced he will not continue as a trainer.
“I do plan to continue as an assistant trainer,” Nicholl told Daily Racing Form. “It was a personal decision, not something I really want to discuss. It was a very amicable decision…”
Nicholl declined to comment any further on July 23 to The Courier Journal, saying only that Lukas was “like a father” to him.
Lukas liked to joke he couldn’t retire because there was always another round of 2-year-olds to train. But the joke was his reality. As a horseman, he was known for finding top talent at yearling sales, which led him to the first Saturday in May across four decades with more than 50 horses that ran in the Kentucky Derby, which features the top 3-year-old thoroughbreds.
Sale records show on July 8, a half dozen hips, consigned by Mulholland Springs and trained by Lucas, sold in Fasig-Tipton’s sale for Horses of Racing Age.
That included three unraced 2-year-olds ― Summer Date, Lost Valley and Delancey Street ― as well as a pair of 3-year-olds (Waco and Going Steady), and 4-year-old Our Keepsake.
The six horses sold to six different buyers for a total of just over $1 million.
Following his death, four Lukas-trained-and-stabled horses ran at Ellis Park, including Innovator and Rip Cord, a 2-year-old colt.
Both colts are owned by BC Stables, who moved 15 horses to megatrainer Steve Asmussen’s barn. Asmussen told Daily Racing Forum that 11 of the 15 horses are 2-year-olds.
For now, The Cowboy Code and a Trainer’s Daily Dozen, both plaques featuring sayings that Lukas lived by, remain hanging in his barn. Some tack still hangs in the tack room and his office remains wallpapered with photos of horses, mid-flight, en route to victory.
The stalls ― once full of high-dollar thoroughbreds ― contained equipment and white stall gates leaning against a wall. Just beyond the office doors, flowers slumped in a vase.
Will Barn 44 ever resemble what it once did the last 36 years? Trainers give a resounding “no.”
They work in an industry where moving on is the one sure fact they can hang their hat on. It’s one horse out, one horse in, training 365 mornings a year and moving tracks from Saratoga to Santa Anita.
Churchill Downs did not respond to a request for comment about what will happen once Barn 44 is empty, but horse trainers told The Courier Journal that Lukas’ legacy will live on beyond the three-quarter pole on the backside of Churchill Downs at the gap (where horses enter and exit the racetrack) that is affectionately referred to as the Lukas gap, because of its proximity to Barn 44.
His legacy will live on, at backsides across the U.S. each time two horsemen lead a horse to the paddock. Nobody did that until Lukas came along.
It will live on with the aerodynamic silks used in races. It was Lukas who transitioned from the old silks to the new.
Then there’s trainers having multiple strings of horses. Lukas took that idea to a whole other level.
And at Churchill Downs, it is ingrained in the bright-white painted wood since Lukas showed up in 1989, when he hung flowers, raced a filly against the boys and changed an industry, all from Barn 44.
Stephanie Kuzydym is an enterprise and investigative sports reporter. Reach her at sk******@*************al.com.
This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: D. Wayne Lukas Barn 44 at Churchill Downs emptied following death
