Off Track Thoroughbreds

Lauren Henry and Stony Creek enjoy a moment at the recent Woodside event in California.

In an effort help an injured T-Bred, a collaborative effort linking two major California horse charities bore fruit this year in the form of Stony Creek, an impeccably put-together Eventing prospect many expect to “go big.”

Stony’s story began shortly after his last race at Santa Anita Park in 2012.

After the strikingly pretty animal bowed a tendon, he was laid up to recuperate at a farm funded by CARMA (the California Retirement Management Account), until his tendon healed. When he proved himself ready for post-racing training, CARMA reached out to Thoroughbred re-training/re-homing organization CANTER California. This is when the magic happened.

Stony Creek
Sire: Bertrando
Dam: Bounty Bay
Foal date: March 7 2009Though she wasn’t in the market for a new horse, Lauren Henry was encouraged to go take a look at the off-track Thoroughbred last July. “He was so impeccably put together that standing in a field, he showed up all the other horses,” Henry says. “He just has this presence about him, and a really kind eye.”

So she made a deal with CANTER California Executive Director Ali Dacher. The women agreed that Henry would start him under saddle, bulk him up, and decide after two months whether to keep him or return him to CANTER.

As if she could ever return him!

“Training him, I realized he was the easiest horse I had ever restarted,” Henry says. “He has a really good work ethic, and within the first couple days of me riding him, he was moving forward and off my leg and willing to stretch into the contact.”

Stony Creek moves injury free thanks to the care of CARMA and CANTER California. Photo by Nell Western

With no hint of his previous injury, Stony is already proving to be quite the talent. In April at the Fresno County Horse Park, he went Novice and ended up in 4th place overall competing against all breeds. “We went up against quite a few fancy Warmbloods—he was great!”

In subsequent events, Stony has caught the eye of some big trainers, who predicted Stony will “take Lauren far” in her career. And her friends, the ones with the Warmbloods, are now telling her they might also consider a T-Bred for their next horse!

“Everybody who sees this horse go, just adores him,” Henry says.

Make Me King turned out to be the horse of a lifetime for Sally Hamlin, a self-described timid rider. JAS Photography

Months after a horseback riding spill sent Sally Hamlin to the hospital via med flight, she stood in a field eyeing a 4-year-old T-bred that everyone said was “all wrong” for the timid, middle-aged rider.

“When my riding coach and I went out to look at this beautiful gray racehorse, she said I was crazy to consider buying a 4-year-old Thoroughbred,” Hamlin recalls. “The whole time we were looking at him, she was muttering under her breath. She was so funny. She just kept saying, ‘No. No. No. No.’ ”

Concerned though she was about getting another horse who might spook and bolt as her beloved horse Charlie had, only months earlier, causing a head injury, the placid gray she calls King seemed so kind.

Make Me King
Sire: Fair Skies
Dam: Lawful Beat
Foal date: May 8, 2003“The whole time, he kept watching me. He came up and rubbed his head on me, and he seemed like such a sweet horse. Some of this stuff I know, in hindsight, sounds really stupid,” she admits with a laugh. “But I lied to my riding coach! I told her I was getting him for less than the asking price and I promised that if he didn’t work out, we could sell him.”

But the 52-year-old chemist from Washington, D.C. knew soon after her hasty decision that this was an experiment that would work.

“I got him in late April 2008, and my coach started riding him the second day. At the end of the first week, she said, ‘You know I think you can start riding him next week.’ I got on him in May and he was so quiet,” Hamlin says. “I was nervous at first, I’m a timid rider, but within five minutes I wasn’t nervous anymore.”

Sally Hamlin’s coach was so against the idea of buying King that she wouldn’t even look at him. She has since come to adore the horse!

She cantered the next day.

Hamlin soon realized that while she had loved many horses, including Charlie, who still has a good home with her, this kind-eyed gray Thoroughbred was what that lightning strike horsemen refer to as a “horse of a lifetime.”

“Even though he’s not perfect, and can act up a little, all I have to do is sit back and pull on the reins and he’ll stop,” she says. “I just think he has a pure soul, and I really think he takes care of me.”

The pair entered schooling shows together after six months, winning ribbons, and enjoying lazy hacks in between. Never aiming to be an A Circuit rider, Hamlin was just happy to regain her confidence in the saddle after a bad spill. And her life with her T-Bred has also opened other doors.

The pair entered the Model Class at the Thoroughbred Celebration Horse Show after King had brief lameness.

She began volunteering several years ago with the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation’s Montpelier Farm, managing the database and assisting with fundraising. And four years ago, she poured her love of horses and her latent artistic talent into a jewelry-making endeavor that has raised nearly $7,000 for the Montpelier Farm.

Hamlin makes pendants and bracelets designed with interlocking hearts and an OTTB insignia that celebrates the off-track Thoroughbred. Created from hand carved wax models, and personalized to honor individual T-breds with carved Jockey Club names, the mementos are her way of saying thank you to the Thoroughbred in her life who turned out to be a gem.

“I really think King is the best thing that ever happened to me.”

To visit SEH Jewelry Designs for Thoroughbred-inspired pieces, please click this hyperlink.