Flag Ranch
Purcell, Oklahoma
flagranch@yahoo.com; 910-734-7772
INCENTIVES: Riata Championship, Royal Crown
Its early, magic cross of cow horse and racehorse blood made Oklahoma’s Flag Ranch the second-greatest breeder of team roping horses of all time, according to QData, with earnings of more than $616,384. That’s partly because of Larry and Bobbie Rice’s athletic stallions One Time Honor (by One Time Pepto out of a Holland Ease daughter) and First Prize Diver (by PYC Paint Your Wagon out of a Mr Jess Perry daughter).
In 2024, aboard a 4-year-old filly by First Prize Diver, Miles Baker terrorized the futurity headers to the tune of $126,521, including a $50,000 payday at last summer’s Old West Futurity in Utah. Meanwhile, Baker also split $37,400 heading at the 2024 Riata Championship on a 5-year-old by One Time Honor.
“Larry Rice was ahead of his time,” Baker said. “Now we’re all trying to breed the same horses he bred and raised 10 years ago.”
In October, the Flag Ranch bred four colts that made the ARHFA World Championship short round under Baker, Kaleb Driggers and Colby Lovell. Driggers explained that his 4-year-old mare by One Fabulous Time can run, with really good footwork, but collects through the turn. That sentiment is similar to what King of the Cowboys Trevor Brazile said about 2023’s leading 4-year-old futurity head horse Bama Fury, by Bamacat out of a Flag Ranch Furyofthewind daughter: “Physically looking at him, you see the run, but riding him, you feel the cow.”
The Flag Ranch also bred Chics Magic Corona, the colt on which Rhen Richard won the 2022 ARHFA World Championship, and Tate Kirchenschlager’s 2022 Royal Crown Champion Meradas First Diver.
“What really separates their program is the way they find the right cross of size, athletic ability, run and cow,” said Kirchenschlager, who has ridden several Flag Ranch-bred horses. “They are just built to be head horses.”
Strategically mixing the perfect traits needed by high-level ropers, Flag Ranch offers Riata Championship and Royal Crown prospects with proven genetics.
“We’ve known Larry a long time, and he’s progressively turned out more and more great horses,” said WPRA World Champion Heeler Jimmi Jo Montera, who has purchased more than a dozen horses from the Rices with her husband Rick. “Larry is just extremely knowledgeable. He knows his crosses—what goes well with what.”
Flag Ranch’s own stallions One Time Honor, First Prize Diver and Bobby Starlight, along with stallions they’ve owned in the past—One Fabulous Time, Vabellez and BR Best Asset—illustrate their variety of proven cow-bred and race-bred mares.
In January, Flag Ranch offers prospects at its annual 2-Year-Old Production Sale, which may include full and half-siblings to roping futurity standouts like Relentless PYC, Lunchbox and Blowin In Time.
