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“Clients buy them, and we break them,” said McClure.
She starts them all out by driving them with so-called “long-lines,” a snaffle bridle fitted with long lines that the handler uses to guide from behind the horse. They start, she said, first in the shedrow, then graduating to outside when ready.
McClure and Cooney readily admit that, sometimes, when accompanying clients on shopping trips, they blow, their savings on horses they buy for themselves.
They’ve also dabbled in breeding thoroughbreds for their own stable. They keep a few broodmares at McClure’s parents’ farm in Orlean, and Michael is bringing along 3-year-old filly Tamany Sweep, his first homebred, by Aaron’s Gold. He hopes to start her on the flat this fall.
“Above all, we’ve been truly blessed with wonderful owners,” McClure said, naming Frank Petralmo and Dennis Gordon as two who particularly er\joy owning steeplechasers and coming to the races to watch them run.
As she talks, Oscar Max, Petralmo’s timber star, sticks his head out of the stall and leans out to give McClure a kiss. It’s a touching, sweet, rural farm scene.
But the horse has another response for Cooney. Leaving McClure with a sigh, Oscar Max reaches over and grabs Cooney’s muscled forearm between his bared front teeth. The horse’s chuckle was nearly audible — he doesn’t bear down on Cooney’s arm, but just teases his regular rider with the joke,
“When he’s finished racing, he’ll have a permanent home at Frank’s,” McClure Baid of the personable brown gelding.
She looked at Cooney and laughed. There was more work to do, as always, but the “Oscar incident” was, they agreed, a nice morning break to share —just another moment of togetherness.
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