Page 95 - Barrel Stallion Register 2019

“To be able to be a rodeo horse and run in those 12-second pens, then be able to run in a horse show pen and be competitive in both, it takes a particular athlete,” she said. “He’s the toughest gelding I’ve ever owned. Things don’t have to be perfect for him, and he’s going to try no matter what.”
In September 2017, Cumper and I Do One Two Three won the Tommy Wylie Memorial Show in Swanton, Ohio, to qualify for the 2018 On The Road With Dawn & Clea “Best of the Best” show, held in late August in Springfield, Ohio, the biggest show of their careers to date.
The event featured more than $60,000 in total purses across all of the divisions. They took home an eighth-place check in the Friday go-round to qualify for Saturday’s final, then finished in the middle of the pack. They came back on Sunday to take home third-place money in a lower-stakes open barrel division.
“It is absolutely the most thrilling barrel race I’ve been to in my life,” Cumper said.
In a full-circle moment, Cumper rode I
Do One Two Three at this summer’s Isabella County Fair Rodeo in Mount Pleasant, Michigan. The fairgrounds were once the home of Mount Pleasant Meadows, the gelding’s de facto home track, and the two got to compete over the same dirt that I Do One Two Three raced over nine years ago.
I Do wasn’t quite able to secure the victory in Mount Pleasant, but Cumper appreciated what the moment meant.
“Honestly, it was really weird,” she said. “He lost his footing behind the third barrel,
so I ended up two holes out of the money,
but it was awesome to have him there on that racetrack again in a different setting – for him to be on the same dirt that he raced on and get to run barrels on. That was so cool.”
Cumper said she’ll occasionally run into
a rodeo entry clerk that recalls I Do’s name from his racetrack days. It’s hard to tell just how much the first half of the gelding’s career fed into the second half, but it’s clear no matter where he ran, I Do One Two Three’s speed was going to shine through like the white of his coat.
“There’s no doubt that he learned to run on the track,” Cumper said. “He learned his quick speed and how to place his feet on the track, and I think that’s something that horses that didn’t race on the track still need to learn. He learned how to get out of the gates quick, and all the fundamentals that those guys did with him sure helped.
“There are times in my mind when I thought to myself, ‘How great would this horse have been if he hadn’t learned to run on the track?’” she continued. “Maybe this would have been an easier journey, but I don’t think so. This horse was born to run.”
It’s hard to tell just how much the first half of the gelding’s career fed into the second half, but it’s clear no matter where he ran, I Do One Two Three’s speed was going to shine through like the white of his coat.
I Do One Two Three wins the Lorelei Derby-G3 at Will Rogers Downs on his way to becoming that year’s World Champion Running Paint Horse.
SPEEDHORSE 93
I Do One Two Three wins his trial to the 2010 Graham Paint & Appaloosa Derby-G1 at Remington Park.
Kellie Johnston, Coady Photography Dustin Orona Photography