John Mitchell commanded the Tunica 5 & 6-Year-Old Open Cutting on Wednesday with a one-two-three finish on Smooth Asa Zee, Peptos Stylish Miss and Aristo Twister. He also showed Fancy Lookin Cat and Sarahs Super Cat to sixth and seventh place in the 14-horse finals.

Mitchell scored 222 points for his win on Smooth Asa Zee and 219.5 for reserve with Peptos Stylish Miss, and earned a total of $68,042 for all five performances.

Smooth Asa Zee, Peptos Stylish Miss, Fancy Lookin Cat and Sarahs Super Cat are all owned Slate River Ranch, Weatherford, TX. Aristo Twister is owned by Nelson and Suzanne Knight; Nelson is the son of Slate River owner, Glade Knight.

Together, the five horses have earned over $580,000, almost exclusively in open competition under Mitchell, who is back in the saddle in Thursday’s 4-Year-Old Finals riding Slate River’s Pepto N Peppy.

Click here for complete results with pedigrees.

A recent post about the prevalence of Leo San blood in 2009’s top sires of cutting horses drew a lot of response from readers, and led me to dig a little deeper. Alice Walton, who bred and owns 2009 Borden Milk NCHA Futurity champion Rockin W, noted that he descends through his dam, NCHA Horse of the Year Boon San Kitty, to her maternal granddam, Hula Stopa, a double-bred granddaughter of Leo San.

In addition, Rockin W carries another cross to Leo San through Grulla San, the dam of his paternal grandsire High Brow Hickory. As noted in the earlier post, Rockin W’s sire, Dual Rey, also carries Leo San.

A closer look reveals that all but one of the 28 finalists in the 2009 NCHA Futurity trace to Leo San bloodlines, sixty years after that stallion’s birth.

Brad Mitchell claimed the Augusta Futurity on Saturday with a 223-point win on Cat A Rey and the reserve championship with 222.5 riding Holly Is Smooth. Cat A Rey is owned by Painted Springs Farm, Nashville, TN; Holly Is Smooth belongs to Robert Norton, Columbia, TN.

“It was nerve-wracking,” said Painted Springs Farm owner Barbara Brooks of Cat A Rey’s run, the first in the second set of cattle.“I don’t think I breathed during the two-and-a-half minutes.” Brooks won last year’s non-pro championship on Sass And The City, also conditioned by Mitchell, 39, who is beginning his second decade as resident trainer for Painted Springs.

Cat A Rey, by Dual Rey out of Sheza Smart Cat, was also a finalist (16th) in the NCHA Futurity and has career earnings of $73,225, including $18,748 for his Augusta win.

Smooth As A Cat daughter Holly Is Smooth, who Mitchell showed immediately following Cat A Rey in the second set, had earned just $312 prior to the Augusta Futurity, where she collected $13,509.

Chad Bushaw, Weatherford, TX, won the Augusta Non-Pro Futurity and $14,110 with 219 points aboard Twisting Playdough. Bushaw also rode the Freckles Fancy Twist daughter to place fifth in the Abilene Spectacular earlier this month.

Jarrett Callahan, McConnells, SC, was reserve non-pro champion with 216 points on Catman Bingo, by High Brow Cat.

Click here for complete Augusta Futurity results with finalist pedigrees.

If you haven’t been there or don’t live in North Texas, you might not know that the new $1.15 billion home of the Dallas Cowboys isn’t in Dallas. It’s in Arlington, 20 miles west of Dallas, near the former site of Arlington Downs, acclaimed in the 1930s as one of the world’s finest racetracks.

Arlington Downs left little to be desired in the way of luxury and efficiency. A posh clubhouse served well-heeled Texas Jockey Club patrons, while the main grandstand seated 16,000, with standing room for 10,000 more spectators.

The barns, some of which were still standing 25 years ago, accommodated 1,000 horses, along with their grooms and handlers. Running water, gas and electricity, still luxuries in most rural Texas homes, were available in all the stable areas.

Two tracks – a one-mile track and a one and one-eighth with a one-quarter mile straight shoot – were surrounded by five-inch metal pipes with faucets set in every every 100 feet to serve as a state-of-the-art watering system.

Grandstands, barns, and fences glistened in white and blue and featured the Three D brand of the track’s owner, W.T. Waggoner, (pictured) who unlike Dallas Cowboys’ owner Jerry Jones, footed the entire cost ($5 million in 1929) of his facility.

Once asked if it was his goal to own all of North Texas, Waggoner reported, “No, I don’t aim to buy it all, just what joins me.”

By the late 1920s, Waggoner, whose fortune was based on land and cattle and redoubled by oil discoveries on his ranches, owned over half a million acres in North Texas. Approaching the eighth decade of a life that had denied him little, he had one dream yet to realize – he wanted to build the greatest racetrack in the world and bring legalized wagering to Texas tracks. Read the rest of this entry »

Scrabble – that’s what comes to my mind when I read an extended pedigree from right to left. Which vowels and consonants spell a winner’s name? In the case of the top cutting sires of 2009, Leo San, foaled in 1949, is an essential “piece.”

High Brow Cat’s pedigree is a good example. The all-time leading sire (and 2009 leader) carries Leo San on the top and bottom sides of his pedigree. His sire, High Brow Hickory, is out of Grulla San, by Leo San Hank by Leo San. His dam, Smart Little Kitty, is by Smart Little Lena (ranked #6), whose dam, Peppy Smart, is by Peppy San by Leo San.

Smart Little Lena is the sire of Smart Lil Scoot and Smart Mate, ranked #7 and #8, respectively. While High Brow Cat is the sire of #4 ranked Smooth As A Cat, who gets another dose of Leo San through his dam, Shes Pretty Smooth, whose paternal grandsire is Peppy San Badger.

Number 2 ranked Dual Rey is linked to Leo San through his sire, Dual Pep (ranked #5), a son of Peppy San Badger, by Mr San Peppy, by Leo San. Peppy San Badger and thus Leo San also turn up in the pedigrees of Peptoboonsmal (#3), Smooth As A Cat (#4), and CD Olena (#10).

Leo, Leo San’s sire, crops up in the pedigrees of Smart Lil Scoot and Playgun through Leo Pan, the dam of Jewel’s Leo Bars and Son O Sugar. CD Chica San Badger, CD Olena’s, dam traces again to Leo through her dam, Zorra Chica.

Playgun also carries Leo through his dam, Miss Silver Pistol. Playgun is the only one of the 2009 top 10 sires not related to Leo San. Read the rest of this entry »

As I whipped up some clam dip this afternoon, for a special gathering, I was reminded of Babe, the Black and Tan Coonhound that befriended us this past Christmas.

It was cold and rainy, when we pulled up to the Water Valley Inn the night of December 26. Perched on a hill overlooking miles of rolling farmland, the 1920s-era farmhouse is our home-away-from-home, when we visit our daughter and her family, whose Owl Creek Winery and vineyards are just down the road.

As our son, Charlie, stepped out of the car, he was greeted by a wagging, wriggling, seal-soft hound that cried and whimpered as if he was her long lost master. Since she was wearing a collar, we hoped we might coax her into the house so that we could read her tag. But when we opened the door, she trotted right in, then stood looking at us with her tail wagging, as if to say, “Welcome home.”

Her tag told us that her name was Babe. While we waited for her owner to return our call, Babe wandered into the kitchen, where I found her standing politely but deliberately in front of a cabinet. She wasn’t exactly pointing, because her lovely, long tail was arched upward and her front end was erect, but I knew that she knew that there was food in the cabinet. Read the rest of this entry »

There are breeding centers that stand more stallions, but Hartman Equine Reproduction Center (HERC), in Whitesboro, TX, has the only roster with three of 2009’s top 10 sires of NCHA money earners – Dual Pep, CD Olena (pictured), and Smart Mate (Dual Pep and CD Olena are also ranked among NCHA’s top 10 all-time leading sires) – no other stallion farm or breeding center has more than one.

“I feel fortunate to have the opportunity to stand these stallions and look forward to a successful year,” said HERC owner, David Hartman DVM, one of the first veterinarians, over 25 years ago, to perform embryo transfer in a commercial setting. Hartman is also an adjunct professor of theriogenology with Texas A&M and, because he has a large herd of closely monitored recipient mares, helps them with a number of research projects.

Dual Pep and CD Olena, both owned by Bar H Ranche, Weatherford, TX, stood their first seasons at HERC in 2009. Dual Pep had begun to experience age-related testicular degeneration and Dr. Hartman was able to improve his pregnancy rate with a relatively new technique of semen processing called EquiPure centrifugation.

This year, Dual Pep’s book is full, and Hartman has leased CD Olena from Bar H Ranche.

“I leased him for at least five years,” explained Hartman, who made the arrangement through Bobby Pidgeon, 71, owner of Bar H Ranche, an all-time and perennial leader among breeders and owners of cutting horses.

“It’s a dream to have the opportunity to manage and promote (CD Olena),” added Hartman, who noted that the stallion’s foals will now be eligible for Breeders Invitational events, including, retroactively, the crop of 2009.