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| Bob Brown's wide range of interests includes competing in western pleasure, racing cars and his "bobber" style motorcycle, feartured on the cover of this month's Street Chopper magazine. |
With a history of racing cars, drumming in a rock band and running marathons, you might wonder how Bob Brown, an
ophthalmologist from Waukee, Iowa, found his way to the show pen at the Bayer Select World Championship Show. “I didn’t know anything about horses until I married my wife,” Bob said. His wife, Sandy, grew up showing western pleasure horses, while Bob paid his way through undergraduate work at the University of Iowa by playing drums in a ’60s cover band.
Bob quit his gig as a professional musician during his second year of medical school, married Sandy, and started riding her family’s horses and exercising polo ponies for the Iowa City polo team.
But the Browns put their horse activities on hold while raising their children – one of which was allergic to animals – and pursued other interests.
“I always had the sports car bug,” Bob said. “The first real sports car I got was a Porsche, and I started auto-crossing Porsches.” Auto-cross is an event where drivers test their skill by negotiating a course of obstacles, one at a time.
Competitive by nature, Bob found much success racing cars. A win in the street stock division at the 1976 Porsche Panorama topped his list of career successes.
In his mid-40s, Bob caught the fitness bug and turned to running. After starting in 10k and 20k races, Bob moved up to marathons, biathlons and even a few triathlons, but said he “swam like a rock” in the latter. He logged times good enough to qualify him for the Boston marathon and placed in the top-10 in the Coors Light biathlon series.
Then, when their last child left home five years ago, the Browns decided it was time to return to their passion for horses.
“We bought 50 acres outside of Des Moines, where I practice ophthalmology, and started raising Quarter Horses,” Bob said. “Now we’re showing western pleasure and we’ve even gotten into racing Quarter Horses.”
“There’s something about horses that I think is the ultimate,” he said. “The sports cars and the motorcycles, they’re machines.” And though he’s pretty proud of his Marilyn Monroe themed “bobber” style motorcycle that recently won the old school division at the Sturgis, South Dakota, bike show, he said, “You can’t really connect with them like you can a horse.”
Bob rode Living Off Interest, a 2002 bay gelding by Pine Interest and out of Im Broke by Shi Bar Skip, in western pleasure at the Bayer Select World this week. Though they didn’t make the finals, Bob’s competitive spirit is alive and well, and ready for things to come.
“I want to come back here and win this thing,” he said. “I’m a competitor. Whatever it’s going to take, I’m going to come back here and win this thing. I hope it’s in the next couple of years, before I get too old to get on my horse.”
