In the Past: Oh Cay N Short & Boyd Rice

 

The excitement is building among reined cow horse enthusiasts as the dates of the first National Reined Cow Horse Association (NRCHA) Snaffle Bit Futurity to be held in Fort Worth, Texas, are just a little more than a month away.

A decade ago, Equi-Stat Elite $5 Million Rider Boyd Rice won his first NRCHA Snaffle Bit Futurity victory in Reno, Nevada. He rode Oh Cay N Short (Oh Cay Quixote x Bit Of Shorty x Shorty Lena), a 2004 gelding bred by Patty Frerichs and owned at the time by Kevin and Sydney Knight, to the high finals composite score of 653.

However before Rice, who had finished runner-up two years before, was able to celebrate, he found himself pacing back and forth in the warm-up pen as he awaited the results of his cow work review that had been called for by the judges. Could the prestigious Open title have eluded him once more?

As the announcement that Oh Cay N Short’s score had been readjusted came across the loudspeakers, Rice nervously stared at the ground. Moments later, though, Rice was all smiles as he heard the original 221.5 had been changed to a 222.5! The veteran cutting horse trainer realized he obtained his goal of winning the reined cow horse discipline’s most prestigious event.

Standing next to him in the winner’s circle as he received his rewards were Oh Cay N Short’s owners, who had purchased the gelding sight unseen as a 2-year-old on Rice’s word alone. Rice was also joined by wife Halee and their two sons, Tatum and Tarin, who had ridden his gelding Gold D Olena to the Futurity Intermediate Non-Pro Reserve Championship.

In 2012, the Knights presented Oh Cay N Short to Rice as a Christmas gift. Rice continued to show the horse, whose lifetime earnings total $238,541, in cutting and reined cow horse events. Among their wins was the World’s Greatest Horseman contest in 2014.