Page 19 - 22 February 2013

Debra Gotovac fuses her passion for Quarter Horse racing with her personal cause: breast cancer awareness.
by Diane Rice
If you’ve been to a Quarter Horse race in the past several years and seen two women wear- ing matching black t-shirts with “Fight Like
A Girl” emblazoned across their backs in bold pink letters, you’ve seen Debra Gotovac and her jockey’s wife, Louanne Wainscott. They were cheering on Swingin Daddyo, Gotovac’s recently retired graded stakes winner.
A breast cancer survivor, Gotovac calls Swingin Daddyo her breast cancer awareness horse. Indeed, the gelding has a deep history of breast cancer connections. Not only did Gotovac survive the disease, but so did Swingin Daddyo’s breeder, Linda Alumbaugh of MLA
International Company. And Gotovac’s trainer, Brad Bolen, lost his mother to breast cancer after she was diagnosed just a week before Gotovac was.
FROM THE WOMB
Gotovac’s Quarter Horse racing roots formed even before she was born. Her grandparents owned a home in Ruidoso, New Mexico, and when her family visited them each summer, they all attended the races together. As a small child, Gotovac napped on the bench seat behind the family’s Jockey Club seats.
Throughout the years since, her family— including her sister—got into and out of the
horse business several times, but since 1999, Gotovac has been in it nonstop.
“I’ve done better as an owner than a breeder,” she said, “but I have been breeding some of my own horses.” 2013 will mark the sixth year her home-breds have raced, and she has leased some out as well. “I’m excited!” she added. “I can’t wait for the season to start to see what they’re going to do.”
A GROWING VENTURE
Her first racehorse, the gelding All New Shine (Special Task–Imarealeasterbunny, by Bunny Bid), whom Gotovac bought at the All American Select Sale in 2000, accrued a mod- est race record of 10-1-4-0 and earned $4,215 in his two years on the track. The thrill of that first win helped seal Gotovac’s future in rac- ing. She continued to acquire contenders and for a time she was the second largest owner of Quarter Horse racehorses in the United States.
“She started off with one horse that first year,” said her trainer of 13 years, Brad Bolen of San Angelo, Texas, who also manages
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