Page 52 - August_2023

“I like to buy yearlings out of really good mamas that have really good records themselves; I feel the mare is about 80% of the offspring’s potential.” – Tom Scheckel
formally trained, he says he learned the hard way. “When you’ve got to earn money, you learn fast,” he adds.
In 1975, he married his wife, Pat, who also grew up in Bellevue. They had three children: their daughter, Casey, a radiologist who’s also involved in Quarter Horse and Paint racing;
a son, Josh, who buys, repairs, and sells heavy equipment; and another son, Jake, who’s also in the construction business.
In his halter-horse life, Tom owned Kids Classic Style (Kid Clu-Tootsy Rolls Redford, Rolls Redford), the World’s Leading Sire for several years in a row; and this year’s Leading
HIS RACING ADVENTURES
Tom entered the racing industry in 2015 when he attended the government dispersal of confiscated racehorses at Heritage Place. He went home owning a handful of promising runners. “I put them on the track, and they made pretty good money,” he says. “A good-bred animal coming out of good mares is important.
I like to buy yearlings out of really good mamas that have really good records themselves; I feel the mare is about 80% of the offspring’s potential.”
“Tom has a prodigious knowledge of
Six, Tres Seis) who won the same race in 2016, and Tom’s all-time favorite horse Aqua Flash (First Moonflash-Aquafina, First Down Dash), who won it in 2018. Aqua Flash, bred by McColee Land & Livestock LLC and trained by Shawna Manriquez,
also had the fastest time in her trial for the Heritage Place Futurity.
Tom also sent two fillies he purchased to Graded stakes-placed status: Painted Dynasty, by FDD Dynasty and out of the PYC Paint Your Wagon daughter Tygers Painted Girl; and A Tres Of Sign, by Tres Seis and out of the PYC Paint Your Wagon
Sire of halter horses, Execute (Mr Touchdown Kid-Forever Coolest, Coolest), bred by Rita Crundwell of Dixon, Illinois. He also owns a Paint Horse World Champion and has won 20 World and Reserve World titles in the Paint and Quarter Horse industries.
“Halter horses are pretty to look at, but you don’t get checks; you get trophies and ribbons,” he says. “I’ve got a whole room full of that stuff but in the racehorse business, the horse has
to win, not the guy leading him. And in the racehorses, the checks are good all over; you can go anywhere and cash them.”
pedigrees and is willing to back it up with
the funds necessary for a potentially great racehorse,” adds fellow racehorse owner Tom Maher, an attorney from Pierre, South Dakota, who has partnered with Scheckel on several runners. “And he’s got a very great eye for fillies that have the potential to be broodmares after they’re done racing.”
Tom’s knowledge led him to buying his first stakes winner, Streakin PR (Corona Cartel-Bonnie Streakin, Streakin La Jolla), who won the Valley Junction Futurity at Prairie Meadows in 2015. He was followed by Jess Wild For You (Mr Jess Perry-Wild
daughter First Painted Sign.
Painted Dynasty, a 2015 filly bred
by Michael C. Teel and trained by Jason Olmstead, won her Remington Park Oklahoma-Bred Futurity trial and ran third in the Prairie Meadows Juvenile Challenge. At three, she won her Gopher State Derby trial, finishing the final as runner-up, won her trial for the Canterbury Park Derby
and her trial and the final for the Prairie Meadows Derby Challenge. She then
ran third in the AQHA Derby Challenge Championship-G3 at Los Alamitos. She came back at four and ran second in the Bob
Courtesy Thomas Scheckel
Thomas and Pat Scheckel
K.C. Montgomery
Thomas with AQHA Reserve World Champion Designed To B Clasik.
Susan Bachelor, Speedhorse
Tom Maher
Coady Photography
Tom’s first stakes winner Streakin PR winning the 2015 Valley Junction Futurity at Prairie Meadows.
“Tom has a prodigious knowledge of pedigrees and is willing to back it up with the funds necessary for a potentially great racehorse.” – Tom Maher
50 SPEEDHORSE August 2023