Page 97 - August 2016

Most of the time, traffic moves pretty smooth. Most people who are licensed on a track know exactly where they’re supposed to be. But, sometimes a horse can get in an area where he shouldn’t be, and you have to make sure that kind of stuff doesn’t happen and everything keeps flowing smoothly.”
That is only the beginning. After the morning works are finished, the pony and outriding horses work the races in the afternoon or evening, where it’s their job to get the racehorses and their riders to the starting gate safely, in order, and on time. A pony horse
leads each individual racehorse, while the
head outrider leads the parade to post and the assistant outrider follows it.
The post parade is where, to the public at large, ponies and outriders are most visible. Or not. When everything is going according to plan, no one notices them. When something blows up, they are front and center.
“Those poor ol’ pony horses get thumped on and beat up all day long – they’re tough,” says Mike “Mitch” Mitchell, the outrider at Ruidoso Downs. “Outriding horses are tough, too, and
I can’t get anything done without them. I can only be as good as my horse will let me be. I’ve got to ride a really, really fast horse. People give a lot of money for those real royal-bred racehorses and then the little jockey falls off, well, I gotta go catch him. If there’s a wreck, I want to be riding something fast enough to catch the horses before they get hurt. I just let the clutch out, it’s game on, and then it’s over.”
The pony horse and rider help in a multitude of ways in the morning at the track, including galloping, exercising, and working the racehorses.
In the afternoon or evening, the pony horse and rider have the job of safely getting the racehorses and jockeys to the starting gates. Here trainer Clint Crawford ponies Jess Good Candy and jockey Ivan Carnero to the gates before their victory in the 2015 All American Futurity.
photo by Bee Silva
photo by Richard Chamberlain
An outrider needs to be aware of everything on the track and must catch or corner a horse and get him off the track if one gets loose.
photo by Bee Silva
photo by Bee Silva
photo by Bee Silva
SPEEDHORSE, August 2016 95