Page 24 - NMHBA Spring 2020

It’s 3:30 in the morning at Sunland Park, and Thoroughbred trainer Joel Marr is leaving his home in Tularosa for the 100-mile, two-hour
drive back to his barn at Sunland Park.
It’s the back end of a round trip Marr makes
three, sometimes four times a week between his stable at the racetrack near El Paso and his ranch in the Tularosa Basin.
Year after year, Marr is unquestionably one of the most successful thoroughbred trainers in New Mexico. His horses consis- tently end up in the winner’s circle, and he has no shortage of owners who want to be a part of his successful barn.
But as much time and energy that Marr spends at his job, he devotes just as much atten- tion and passion for his role as husband and dad to wife Teresa and teenage daughters Shacie and Shaeden.
Shacie is in her senior year at Tularosa High School and Shaeden is finishing up her sophomore year. Both compete in numerous sports, from volleyball in the fall to basketball and softball in the winter and spring. Both also rodeo and last year led the Tularosa team to the state championship.
Kids these days seem to grow up faster than ever and are out of the nest before you know it. So, Joel and Teresa try diligently to be there for every basketball game, every track meet, every state tournament.
On this particular weekend in February, Marr left Sunland Park on Friday to make sure he was there when the Tularosa girls basket- ball team played at Dexter that night. After the game, Marr and his family drove back to Tularosa and he then left for Sunland long before dawn.
It’s a scenario that plays out time and again in the lives of the trainers and jockeys who are part of the nomadic nature of horse racing. New Mexico’s five tracks comprise a year-round circuit that requires families to juggle schedules and make sacrifices.
It’s a way of life that former jockey and now Quarter Horse trainer James Gonzales knows very well. So too La Feliz Montana ranch owner Javier Rodriguez and Quarter Horse trainer Juan Carlos Gonzalez.
As the parents of five boys, James Gon- zales and his wife Antoinette have worn out
a lot of tires and spent a lot of time on the road between their home in Las Vegas, N.M. and the five tracks. Though not always pos- sible, James and Antoinette try to catch every football game, basketball game, and other sports that their sons--James III, Sebastian, Matthew and twins Jesse James and Natha- nial compete in.
“A lot,” says James when asked if he’s ever figured out the amount of miles he travels every year to see his sons compete in sports. “I try not to miss a game, no matter what.”
As any parent on the planet will attest, the parenting thing never ends, and Javier Rodri- guez is proof of that.
Rodriguez, 51, splits time between his 280- acre ranch in the Hondo Valley east of Ruidoso and his second home in Las Vegas, Nev., where he owns a construction company and where his sons Javier Jr., 28, Adrian, 26, and daughter Jeanette, 23, live.
“When they were little, we traveled a lot because they played baseball and soccer,” says Rodriguez. “When I couldn’t get to their games, I’d watch them on my iPad.”
Juan Carlos Gonzalez and his wife Andrea don’t have kids, but they know patience and compatibility are crucial to making it all work when you’re in the busi- ness of horse racing.
Juan Carlos and his dad Juan M. have
a solid Quarter Horse training partnership. This summer, they plan to send horses to Los Alamitos in California and add a couple of Thoroughbreds to their barn. That means Juan Carlos is having to do considerable traveling.
“I’m home three to four days a week
at the most, it’s not easy,” says Juan Car- los. “You definitely have to find the right girl, and she has to be willing to put in the sacrifice of me traveling so much. She’s an (equestrian) jumper, and the fact she’s a horse lover helps a bunch.”
One thing all trainers have in common is the enthusiasm and optimism that surfaces with the arrival of Spring. Spring is when the new crop of first-time runners--the so-called “babies” make their debut.
What follows is a list of trainers and a sample of some of the 2-year-old New Mexico breds they are training for this summer and fall’s futurities at Sunland, Ruidoso, Farming- ton, Zia Park, and Albuquerque.
It’s a small sample, but there’s always the possibility that from the quarter horses will emerge another Real Wind, a By By JJ or Handsome Jack Flash, all three New Mexico breds who went on to win the All American Futurity against open competition. Or per- haps another Bigg Daddy or Mister Riptide, also state breds, who were the All American runners-up the last two years.
22 New Mexico Horse Breeder
Youngsters
By Pete Herrera