Trainer Justin Wright’s staff call Metallic Flame “Tex” around the barn. Given the sterling performance the son of Metallic Cat put in at the Reno Snaffle Bit Futurity, that could be exactly where the gelding will be going next.
The 3-year-old owned by Bill Stevenson was good right out of the gate during the finals on Sunday, Sept. 16, setting the tone with a 220 in the herd work. He stayed among the leaders in the rein work and finished with a flourish by marking 225 down the fence. He and Wright finished with a championship-winning composite of 662.5 (220 herd/ 217.5 rein/225 cow).
“He’s really good out of the herd, but tonight I think he proved he might be fence horse,” said Wright, of Santa Maria, California.
The win earned $35,000 for Stevenson, who Wright said forwarded the horse to him relatively recently after the gelding spent time with trainers Tom Shelly and Nick Dowers. Wright rode Metallic Flame at last month’s National Stock Horse Association [NSHA] Futurity, where the horse finished sixteenth in the Futurity Open.
“He was actually real good through the go rounds [at the NSHA] and in the fence work he just drew kind of a faster cow. And, he was real good, but kind of got outrun a little bit,” Wright said. “But he’s grown up just in the two weeks. He’s matured a lot. I wasn’t planning on bringing the horses that we showed in Vegas here, but I thought that he could potentially have a chance here and he’s just continuing to get better. And, he showed a lot of heart this week.”
Reserve Champions Reykatasize and Zane Davis marked a composite of 654 (219 herd/216.5 rein/218.5 cow). They earned $22,000 for C Ranches Inc, of Battle Mountain, Nevada. The mare (Kit Kat Sugar x Reychell Rey x Dual Rey) was bred by Double Dove Ranch, of Fort Worth, Texas.
The goal is for Metallic Flame to join Scooter Kat, a son of Kit Kat Sugar that Wright won the NSHA Futurity Open Championship aboard, among the barn’s possible National Reined Cow Horse Association (NRCHA) Snaffle Bit Futurity contenders.
“He’s grown up a lot this week,” Wright said of Metallic Flame. ” He feels like he could go do it all over again.”
Bred by Danielle Irlbeck Koehler, of Happy, Texas, Metallic Flame is the third money earner out of Scooby Dooby Dual. An earner of $17,131 in the show pen, the mare by Dual Pep has been represented by two full siblings to Metallic Flame: Metallic Sparkle ($5,948, by Metallic Cat) and Bling My Ride ($1,337, by Metallic Cat).
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