The Next Generation

The next generation has arrived.

About 10 months ago, Danny and I purchased a mare we had never seen from someone we never met in person.  The only thing we really knew about the mare was that she was in foal to In Over My Head.  The plan was simple.  Cross our fingers and expect that roughly 10 months in the future we would have a little colt that resembled his dad.  Seemed easy enough, right? 

This was all based on the simple hope that we could extend the experience we had with In Over My Head.  Since he was done racing, we’d have to look to the next generation to keep this ride going.  I'm quite certain that anyone in the breeding business would have told us to temper our expectations.  It is far from a given that you will ever end up with an offspring with all the features we wanted.  Luckily, we didn’t take the time consult anyone with any actual experience prior to making the decision because if we did, this latest chapter would likely not be written.

As we forged ahead holding onto the motto, “Ignorance is bliss” we simply waited for our Mini Mo to arrive.  A couple other mares started to have baby Mo’s.  Some were colts, some were fillies.  Some looked like him, others did not.  All seemed to look really good overall (which is great for Mo’s future breeding options) and we were starting to get pretty anxious to see ours.

It was on Monday morning of April 17^th that Danny and I got a text from Lesa Peters telling us that it could be any day now.  The mare, Crystal Slipper, was getting close and the happy-go-lucky feeling of “let’s just wait for our little Mo to come along” started to fade away. 

What happened next started to resemble the feeling prior to a race.  On race day, the last handful of minutes prior to the start is when doubt washes over you like a tidal wave.  The same thing started to happen with us and our little plan for a mini Mo.   

What if we don’t get a colt that looks like Mo?  I guess that would be OK, but it would lose some luster.  What if we don’t get a colt at all…what if it’s a filly?  We got over that one too…fillies can really be just a fun.  We even came up with a girl name, but deep down we still hoped for colt.  The real concern was health.  What if something happened during birth?  What if he or she only has 3 legs???

Much like waiting for your own kids to be born you do just that.  Wait.  It was out of our control and just hoped for the best.

On Tuesday April 18^th I woke up in the middle of the night.  Hoping that I still had a couple of hours to sleep before the alarm went off, I checked my phone to see what time it was.  The time was actually 4am, but there was something else that caught my eye.  I noticed that two text messages that had come in after I went to bed.  The first was a picture what appeared to be a horse.  The second was a text from Danny. 

I knew that our horse had been born.  Was it a boy?  Did it look like In Over My Head?  As my heart rate quickly started to pick up speed, I sat up in bed and unlocked the phone.

The first message that I read was from Danny: 

  

“Now THAT looks like Mo!  Wow.” 

Engage goosebumps.  Heart rate continuing to accelerate.  Next I went to the picture and here is what I saw:

My response back to Danny:

“Holy smokes!!!  It’s a baby Mo!”

After 10 months of waiting, it’s official.  Our plan worked.  We have a Mo clone!!! 

Well at least in terms of looks which is a great start.

This little guy is darn near a spitting image of his father.  What is just as exciting is that Lesa said that he has shown some similar personality traits as his old man.  Hopefully he gets Mo’s intelligence to go with his good looks.

We will be forced to live in reality at some point, but for now, we can look at him as our little future champion.  We can think about seeing him out on the racetrack, closing hard like his daddy did as we run into the winner circle to celebrate another victory.  We will obviously have to wait to see if those things ever play out, but at least now have a little horse that we can go visit.  We can get to know his personality and hopefully start to form a connection like we did with Mo.

Over the last few months, I have hung a lot of racing memorability in our basement showing the multiple generations of our family’s time in the business. I have a magazine cover of Speedy Rodney winning the United Nations Trot in 1964, a win picture from the 1980s with Grandpa, Greg, my dad and brother Kirk, a win picture of Kirk’s filly from the 1990s, Grandpa and Greg’s horses from the early 2000’s and of course many pictures of In Over My Head, Greg, Danny, Kacy, Laura and me.  I’m very proud of the collection, but we have a gap forming from the most recent picture, which was from the summer of 2015.

After Mini Mo was born, I was thinking that maybe I should hang a picture of him, but hesitated since he hasn’t won anything yet (and won’t for a least a couple years…if ever!).  After further reflection, I’ve changed my mind. He is going on the wall long before he ever races.  He’s an extension of the dream and he belongs with all the horses that came before him no matter what he ends up doing as a racehorse.

As of April 18^th at 1:10am I can officially say the dream is alive and well.  Welcome to the family Mini Mo….now we just need to get you an official name!  

Danny and I plan to head down for a visit in the next couple of weeks and we will bring back more pictures.  Until then, I'll let you decide if the two look alike: