First things first. In Over My Head will return to the racetrack this Friday at Maywood Park in the Open pace. It isn’t a horribly tough field, but any Open won’t be easy. He drew an outside post (#7), but we are just excited about him getting back on the track. As long as he gets a good, clean trip we will be happy with however it shakes out. No more getting backed into. No more breaks. Just a clean trip. Cross your fingers.
In other news, In Over My Head’s strong season thus far has allowed us to grow the stable! Greg, Danny and I headed down to Lexington this weekend for the annual Lexington Select yearling sale. Greg and I went down as buyers, but not certain buyers. We were very galvanized in our game plan, which included:
1. Find a horse we like on paper (the pedigree pages)
2. See this horse in person and agree we like how he looks
3. Make sure that John Butenschoen agrees the horse looks good and has the proper conformation.
4. Stay within our budget. Never overbid. If we don’t get one, we don’t get one.
This four tiered game plan netted us a total of 11 potential targets during the Friday and Saturday session. We bid on a couple Friday night, but were outbid badly. On Saturday, however, we were a little more optimistic since 7 of our 11 were to be sold. The first target came into the ring and we watched only somewhat closely. We expected him to bring a big number. He was a huge, beautiful looking Dragon Again colt out of a very successful mare. The gavel hit at $50,000, far more than we had to spend.
Interestingly enough, we had 3 targets what were selling back to back to back (hips 507, 508 and 509). We agreed that we would treat all of these horses equally and would take the first one we could get. Luckily, they were to be sold in an order that fit our preference. Number 507 was our favorite, 508 second and so on. As we approached #507, things started to get rather tense. Not nearly as tense as the In Over My Head bid (which I detailed in the first blog entry here...scroll down to "Background of the Story": http://inovermyheadracehorse.blogspot.com/2009_02_01_archive.html), but buying a horse is a big decision. When #505 was selling, Greg leaned over to me and said if we got #507, we’d have to change the name. I took a look: Seanie. “Seen-y” I pronounced to myself. What a stupid name.
As Seanie walked in the ring, I’m pretty sure Greg had the same thought process I had: “I really hope he is the one we get”. We really liked his breeding. His sire, Cams Card Shark, was more than proven and his mother, Dream Seeker, had a nice racing career and had shown some serious speed. Additionally, she had already produced a colt named Best Dream Seeker who was one of the best 2 year olds in the country last year. On top of all of that, he had the look. Some Cams Card Shark colts are borderline ugly, but he looked to take on more attributes of a horse named Western Hanover (his dam’s sire). He was a little above average in size, good body length, an athletic build and a good head. Our kind of horse. When the announcer gave the audience a quick rundown of Seanie, he mentioned one thing we didn’t realize. Seanie was a ridgeling, meaning he’s one nut short of a pair if you get my drift. The scientific definition is: “a horse with at least one undecended testicle.” We quickly agreed it didn’t make any difference to us. I had just read an article in Hoof Beats the week before about a famous horse that was sold as a ridgeling named Blissfull Hall. The article remembered his incredible performance in winning the Little Brown Jug ten years ago. Blissfull Hall was a true superstar in his day, winning nearly $1,500,000 in just 31 lifetime starts. I’d take a horse like that!
While it didn’t matter to us, the fact he was a ridgeling probably scared off some buyers. Three things can happen in that situation: you can race him as is and hope that he isn’t bothered by the situation (sometimes it can cause pain that negatively affects their racing performance), you can race him as long as you can and hope the 2nd nut will drop and he will end up with a normal pair like everyone else (this is what happed with Blissful Hall) or you can just castrate him. Many race horses are castrated (or gelded) and it rarely affects their ability to race. However, his potential as a stud horse would obviously be over. That didn’t worry us. We weren’t hoping to hit the double home run of having a horse so great that he could actually be sold as a stud horse after his racing career was over. We were just hoping to buy a successful race horse, so Greg threw his hand in the air and made a bid. When we got to $12,000, the bidding stalled and we were on top. I actually thought for a moment that we would get him for the amazing price of $12,000, but just then it shot to $13,000. Back and forth the bidding went (it appeared we were duking it out with a gentlemen one section over from us in the sales arena) and he got on top at $18,000. After a short pause, Greg made a wise decision to skip $19,000 and go straight to $20,000 (our max). If he went to $19,000, the other guy might go to $20,000 and we would have been out of luck. Greg’s quick decision making worked. After a long 5 or so seconds, the gavel fell. Seanie was ours.
The post victory excitement was a lot of fun. We all agreed that we had got a good horse at a good price. That guaranties nothing, but at the end of the day we did the same thing we did with In Over My Head. We took out time, did our homework and didn’t overbid. We were patient and focused. If Seanie turns out to be a dud, I won’t look back and say, ‘we should have done this…’. Buying a yearling is very risky and we realize that, but we did it the right way.
As we headed out of the areana and back to the barns to get another look at our new purchase, we chatted about what we should change his name to. I suggested One Tough Nut, in reference to his testicular…ahhh…issue, but I don’t think that will end up being his name. We approached the barn where he was kept and I thought back to that morning when we first looked at him. After asking to see #507 we waited for them to bring him out. Danny gave the a quick disclaimer about the potential lack of looks that Cams Card Shark horses have since he and Greg have looked at a lot more than I over the years. They may not look like much, but they are often times fast Danny said. Just then Seanie came out of the barn and I was taken back. There was no disclaimer needed on him. He was strikingly sharp looking animal. A dark brown, almost black coat with a distinctive white mark in the center of his head. When they brought him out after we purchased him, he looked even better. Great look, right size. I was glad he was our horse.
As we walked away and headed back to the sale building for a celebratory brew, Bill Argle (Bill and Kevin Argle joined us who are Greg’s brother in laws/ Danny’s uncles) noticed something on Seanie’s pedigree page we had not noticed. He shared a birthday with Grandpa Carey. April 19th. This is the first yearling Greg and I have bought together and he happened to share an important birthday. Can’t be a bad omen.
We got to the bar and met up with John Butenschoen who seemed genuinely glad we won the bid on Seanie…never a good thing if your trainer feels the opposite! He shared a story of telling his wife that we had bought the horse and immediately commented to her what a stupid name “Seen-y” is. She looked at him half confused and asked if he was serious. Of course, John had replied, it is a dumb name. That’s when Jackie explained that it is pronounced SHAWNY. She thought it might have helped in our decision to buy him. Little did Jackie know, we were just as clueless as John. I looked at the page again: Seanie…wow I am an idiot. Sean (a more traditional Irish spelling of Shawn) and an ‘ie’ instead of a ‘y’. How in the hell did I of all people miss that??? We just bought a horse with my name for God’s sake! That, as you can imagine, led to a great round of laughter at the table. At the end of day, we still planned to change the name. Good for a human, bad for a horse. Also, the only other horse named after me (Shawn’s Way), wasn’t exactly a speed demon. Either way, the horse had the same name as me, so I’m chalking that up to good omen number two.
The post auction talk led us back to my hotel for one more at the bar there. They closed up before we finished so Greg, Danny and I finished our drinks in the hotel lobby. Shortly thereafter, a guy came up to our group and sat down to join the conversation. I’m guessing he saw our sale books sitting on the table as the talk quickly went to horse racing. We talked briefly about the sale and he mentioned he was from Canada. We asked if he ever had any good horses. He responded with the fact that he was a trainer and his name was Ben Wallace. Now, unless you know harness racing you would never know who Ben Wallace was. However, we know harness racing well and know that Ben Wallace was the man who gained a large amount of his fame from training…are you ready for this…BLISSFUL HALL! What are the odds of that random late night meeting at the Sheridan Four Points? A MILLION TO ONE? Are you kidding me??? Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you good omen number three.
The strange thing about buying a yearling is you get all excited and then you wait. Seanie won’t race until at least next June, but that’s the way it is. I’ve always said those yearling sales are like the NFL draft. You get all geared up about who your team took in April, but it doesn’t mean anything until the following September at the earliest. Nonetheless, it is a lot of fun to go down and find what you think will be a winner. You know the saying about the third time’s a charm? How about the third good omen is a charm? Now, Seanie doesn’t need to be Blissful Hall, but we just hope he stays healthy and makes a good horse on the track. Anything above that will be gravy.
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