|
|
|
|
|
Rice counting on San Tule Freckles again
By Chris Gay
Staff Writer
Ronnie Rice may the have the horse to win his first Augusta Futurity Open title in 12 years.
The 1990 Futurity Open champion marked a 220 on San Tule Freckles in Monday's first go-round of the Futurity Open, while his son, Tag, later marked a 217.5 on Short Candy.
|
|
Ronnie Rice: Veteran cutter, horse won World Futurity title in 2001.
FILE/STAFF
|
Ronnie Rice won the 2001 World Championship Futurity in Fort Worth, Texas, on San Tule Freckles, a 4-year-old stud by Freckles Playboy out of Sane Tule Lu.
Ronnie Rice, 49, and Tag, 27, are two of the favorites in this year's Futurity Open. The Rices became the first father-son duo to finish first and second, respectively, in the World Championship Futurity in December. Together, they placed four horses in the top-nine with the elder Rice taking the top prize of $200,000. Combined, they earned more than $500,000.
"It was just our night I guess," Tag Rice said. "Everything just worked out right. It sure was fun."
"It's hard to do," Ronnie Rice said of the one-two finish. "It's hard just to make it to the finals. And when you get that lucky and get everything to go right, it's amazing.
"You can have the best-trained horse up there and stuff can still go bad. Everything's got to be right in order to win that.
"My son and I had four really good colts, and we knew it. I stayed home all last year. I didn't hardly go anywhere. I stayed home and really concentrated on Fort Worth and it paid off," Rice said.
Because he stayed home in Buffalo, Texas, Ronnie Rice didn't make the 2001 Augusta Futurity. But he changed his mind for this year's show.
"I just like training horses," he said. "I just come to these cutting shows to survive, to make a living. It's hard to make a living training horses."
Rice has won three titles in the Augusta Futurity. Aside from his 1990 win, Rice also won two titles in the America's Greatest Cowboy event in 1991 and 1999. That competition has been dropped.
The Rice father-son team is not alone in Augusta this week. Ronnie Rice's brother, Raymond, is competing along with Ronnie's nephew, Boyd Rice, a son of his older brother, Sonny.
Sonny, who Ronnie credits for getting him to show cutting horses, is not competing here .
|
|
|
|
