 It was
February 2000, the second night of the NCHA World Championship Finals,
and all eyes were on Meradas Little Sue. The feisty 9-year-old mare
owned by Corinne and Bill Heiligbrodt of Houston and ridden by Kobie
Wood was leading the race for the 1999 world championship title.
That year, the race had been exceptional; the cutting horse world buzzed
with talk about Meradas Little Sue. If she won the world championship -
and there was little doubt that she wouldn't it would be her third
such title. It would be an astounding feat for such a young mare. It had
been accomplished
only two other times in the NCHA his
Sitting at a table outside the hospitality room, waiting for the finals
to get underway, Corinne Heiligbrodt studied the mare's earnings. In
front of her, a paper revealed that Meradas Little Sue had won
$717,798.92 during her six years on the show circuit. Confident that
Meradas Little Sue would pocket her third world championship by the time
the finals were over, Heiligbrodt was already looking into the future. A
note at the top of that page listed the earnings of NCHA Triple Crown
winner Smart Little Lena, the horse generally considered to have won the
most money in a cutting arena: $745,275.35. According to those
records, less than $50.000 separated the two horses, and Meradas Little
Sue was the one still in the ring.
Run After Run
That wasn't the only difference between the two, however. Smart Little
Lena had won his money at four aged events. In contrast, Meradas Little
Sue had earned the majority of her money the hard way - one weekend run
after another. Sure, there were paychecks at the aged events: At (the
1993 NCHA Futurity, she earned $41,492.00: her 1994 Steamboat boat
Springs Derby championship added $13,046.67 to her financial nest; and
her 1996 Chisholm Trail Classic championship increased it by another
$16,7388. In fact, by 1997. Meradas Little Sue had been a finalist in
nine out of 10 aged events, and she had accumulated $187,317.70.
But those shows were only the beginning of her career. Once you go
beyond those lucrative early years, the paychecks aren't nearly as
substantial. And Meradas Little Sue was still a long way from
$700,000-plus. By pounding the asphalt, traveling from one weekend show
to another, she piled more than a half-million dollars in earnings on
top of her aged-event money and amassed an incredible number of titles.
Living on the road can be a tough grueling life for both horse and
rider, but it's the only way to win world championships. Meradas Little
Sue called "a gritty little mare with a lot of heart" by her trainer,
Kobie Wood won her first NCHA world championship in 1993 when she was
only 3 years old. Besides earning $79,486.82 that year, she also became
the youngest mare to win a world championship title. In 1996, the same
year she won the Chisholm Trail Classic, she still competed in the show
arena enough to earn $42,393.63, ending the year in fourth place in the
NCHA top-10 standings. That year, the NCHA honored Meradas Little Sue
with its prestigious title, "Horse of the Year."
The following year, 1997, Meradas Little Sue won her second world
championship crown with earnings of $108,387.72 - almost $40,000 ahead
of her nearest competitor.
Double Duty
By 1998, though, Meradas Little Sue had already started her dual career.
Her fame in the cutting arena created an intense demand for her foals.
Sending her to the breeding barn was by far a better financial path than
that of total devotion to the competition road. The Heiligbrodts hoped
that with careful management, she could do both. So in addition to
dealing with a show schedule, the mare handled the hormonal ups and
downs associated with breeding, taking time out from her performance
career to visit the breeding barn.
In 1998, Wood showed Meradas Little Sue around an extensive embryo
transfer program. That the mare was even in the top 10 by the time the
World Finals began in Houston was a tribute to her grit and stamina. She
finished fifth in the year-end standings with $41,472.87 and was the
Open World Finals co-reserve champion.
But 1999
provided a brand new opportunity, and Wood set his sights on yet another
title for Meradas Little Sue. He keenly remembers the strategy he
devised that year to pull off her third world championship. "I didn't go
to California or up north, places that would require me to be gone for a
long time, because I had to build the hauling around the breeding," Wood
explained. "When she'd come back from the breeding barn, it'd take a
while to get her ready to show, but then I'd find the biggest cuttings
that were being held, and that's where we'd go. For example, I went to
Batesville, Mississippi, where we showed six times, winning five of them
and placing second in the other one. I also carried her to Steamboat
Springs, to New Mexico, and to Oklahoma. But for the majority of the
time, because she had to be at the breeding barn, we stayed here in
Texas."
Integrating a heavy show schedule with a breeding program has always
posed a problem for showmen. The world championship crown is based on
total dollars won, so missing just one weekend show - not to mention
possibly several consecutive weeks - can open the doors for fellow
competitors to gain ground or even leap ahead of other contenders.
Besides, a change in routine to accommodate reproduction makes getting
and staying physically fit for the return to the arena a problem as
well. Like a race car driver who has to take a fuel stop, it's not just
a snap to get back up to speed.
Wood and Meradas Little Sue started the year strong. To help make up for
the times she would be pulled off the road, her trainer carried her to
every available show before breeding season started. "By February of
that year, I had them by $18-19,000," Wood reminisced, referring to his
lead over the other contestants in the open standings. "Then it was time
for her to go to the breeding barn. She was gone for 107 days the first
time to be bred to Smart Little Lena. I got her back, got her ready to
go again and only showed her for a little while before she had to go
back to the breeding barn again. That time, I lost about 25 days on her.
They got two embryos out of her, and she later went back for a third
breeding, but that one didn't work."
No doubt, it must have been frustrating for Wood. But he stuck to the
plan. "I'd have to start the program all over every time I got her back
after she'd been gone for a while," he continued. "I'd have to get her
legged up again, build her lung stamina and then get her mentally back
into the program. We'd always have trouble the first couple of shows
after we'd start back. It doesn't matter that you've got a great horse;
if you don't have your horse ready, you can't win the race."
Future Dreams
Even with those obstacles to overcome, Meradas Little Sue entered the
1999 NCHA World Championship Finals with earnings of $65,197.51 for the
year. Those dollars began to close the gap between her and Smart Little
Lena, and for that reason, her owners considered sending the more down
the road a little more.
"We're really proud of her," Corinne Heiligbrodt said that evening at
the NCHA World Finals as she contemplated the mare's future. Heiligbrodt
knew Meradas Little Sue was within reach of Smart Little Lena's record,
and she admitted it would "be fun to try," she said, but not at the
expense of getting foals on the ground. "It will have to be
accomplished around her visits to the breeding barn," she confirmed.
Incidentally, while Smart Little Lena has been considered the all-time
money earner by the cutting world, according to office records, that
isn't so. another stallion, Poco Quixote Rio, won the 1989 Gold & Silver
Cutting sponsored by the Super Syndicate - a cutting touted to pay the
winner $1 million. Thus he is officially named the highest money-earning
horse.
One more twist:
Poco Quixote Rio also was once the property of Bill and Corinne
Heiligbrodt.
Breaking Records Meradas Little Sue went into the 1999 NCHA World Finals with a lead of almost $12,000 over the Freckles
Playboy mare Play Who. Theoretically, because a single horse could win
as much as $17,380.00 by sweeping the four nights of competition. Play
Who
had a chance to overcome Meradas Little Sue. Confident in her horse,
Corinne Heiligbrodt didn't believe that was going to happen, and she was
right.
Meradas Little Sue claimed her third NCHA open world championship on
Sunday evening, Feb. 20, 2000. The championship made her the only mare
in the history of the NCHA to win the title three times. The feat tied
her with Cash Quixote Rio, a stallion also ridden by Wood, and the horse
Nigger, ridden
by trainer George Glascock, who won the first three world championships
in 1946, '47 and '48. After winning a third world title,
Wood continued to show Meradas Little Sue periodically. By November
2001, the mare's earnings had reached $730,552.43, according to Equi-Stat,
and although the amount fell short of passing Smart Little Lena's
$745,275.35, Meradas Little Sue was simply too valuable as a producer to
continue the pursuit. Now off the show circuit, this all time top money-earning mare doesn't
need the laurel of overcoming Smart Little Lena's or Poco Quixote Rio's
records - the little mare that built a reputation one cutting run at a
time in front of crowd after crowd has plenty of them. Besides her title
of three-time
NCHA world champion, she is also a three-time NCHA world champion mare
and a $10,000 novice world champion. That, plus her 17 times as a
finalist at aged events, proved she knew how to cut a cow and take home
the bacon.
Mighty Fine Produce
On top of her show record, Meradas Little Sue is developing quite a
reputation as a power-packing mama. At the December 1999 Milt Bradford
Futurity Sale, one of her 2-year-old offspring, Mighty Fine Sue, sold
for $240,000 to football great and cutting horse enthusiast Joe Montana.
A year later, with Kobie Wood on her back at the 2001 NCHA Futurity,
Mighty Fine Sue made her debut in the cutting arena and revealed that
she was born to cut. In the first go-round of the futurity. Mighty Fine
Sue scored 220. She was seventh going into the semifinals, and she also
earned a place in the finals, where, unfortunately, she lost a cow.
"She's a lot like her mama," Wood explained. "She'll make those quick
moves. I remember Meradas Little Sue doing the same thing." Another
Meradas Little Sue baby, a DNA mare named Sue that was sired by Duals
Blue Boon and trained by Shannon Hall, competed at the futurity but lost
a cow in the first go-round. Meradas Little Sue has produced offspring
since 1997, when Sue You, sired by Cash Quixote Rio, was born. She
placed third in the 2001 Bonanza 4-Year-Old open, winning $14,933. Sue
You also won the 4-year-old class at the Southern Futurity with a score
of 225. Her 1998 foals were the 2001 futurity entries. Her 1999 foals
are Pretty Pleasing Sue, sired by Smart Little Lena, and Smart Lil Sue,
a DNA baby by Smart Lil Ricochet. Smart Lil Ricochet, owned by Tommy
Manion of Aubrey, Texas, is a 1994 Smart Little Lena offspring out of
the Son 0 Sugar mare Moria Sugar. In 2000, Merada Little Sue
produced Suemma Cum Laude, sired by Smart Little Lena, and Goody Two
Sue, a DNA foal sired by Smart Lil Ricochet.
Breeding In The Purple
So where did all this power and finesse come from? The late Freckles
Merada is a top-2 all-time leading cutting sire, according to Equi-Stat
records. His offspring have won more than $2.8 million. In addition, the
stallion's bloodline is steeped in honors. Freckles Merada was sired by
Freckles Playboy, the 1973 NCHA co-reserve champion, and out of Lenaette,
the 1975 NCHA Futurity Champion. Lenaette was sired by 1970 NCHA Futurity
champion Doc O'Lena. Thus, the sire side of her pedigree is saturated
with futurity champions....
more coming soon....
|
