Race owner retires family-bred OTTB for shows
Three years after retiring the big, beautiful gelding her family bred for racing, race owner Shannon Casey has taken over the reins of the horse’s training, quite literally, and is now personally jumping him in the low-amateur jumpers in pursuit of the ribbons. Casey has put her 17.1-hand gelding Osprey into training with Olympic Eventing coach Silvio Mazzoni and respected Eventer Hannah Sue Burnett in a quest to provide a happy and fun life for a horse she vows never to sell. “He’s a one-of-a-kind horse, and I’ve loved him since he was born. My racing partner Yolanda Janczewski and […]
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Stakes placed warhorse fights for life in Iowa
A stakes placed racehorse with 72 starts and earnings north of $300,000 battles for his life in spite of an all-out effort by racing connections, including a TV journalist, to retire him. Denham, 9, the son of Unreal Zeal by Mr. Prospector, has battled hoof abscesses, laminitis, and most recently, his coffin bone rotated to within seven millimeters of coming through his hoof’s sole, says Christina Norris, executive director of Unbridled Spirits, a horse retirement facility in Lisbon, Iowa. “He’s fighting for his life,” she says. “It’s hard to say this because there are so many kids who love him, who […]
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Big winner nearly dies on the way to slaughter
All that money, nearly a half million dollars worth of racetrack winnings, couldn’t help her as she thrashed in panic and fear. Flailing beneath the hooves of 30 other terrified horses, last December in a tractor-trailer heading for a Canadian slaughterhouse, once-winning race mare Press Exclusive had lost her balance on the truck, and her place in the world. No longer valuable as a racehorse or a broodmare — she gave birth to nine foals—she fell down among the legs and hooves of the other slaughter-bound horses, and was pummeled as she struggled beneath them, writhing in the shavings and […]
