Casey Hinton aboard Slip Slydun Away, with Cecilia May Hylton in front, and AQHA Executive Committee member Johannes Orgeldinger, at right.
Call it retirement. A hiatus. A lengthy vacation. Whatever it was, the 12-year-old Slip Slydun Away hadn’t qualified for an AQHA World Championship Show since 2003. So when he strode into the World Show arena this year, he was making up for lost time. As the first pair in the pen, AQHA Professional Horseman Casey Hinton and the 1996 bay stallion scored a 217.5 riding to Simon & Garfunkel’s “Slip Slidin’ Away” – and that score was never bested. After the victory, Casey and the horse’s owner, Cecilia May Hylton of Gainesville, Virginia, explained why they engineered a comeback.
Q: Talk me through your run. Casey: Starting off, I thought the first stop was OK. I thought it was a little bit delayed. It wasn’t as good as his other three stops. The first turn, for me, he faked it a little bit, and on that turn, he had his head bent a little more than I would have liked to have seen. The second turn was probably a plus-half, plus-one, so he probably made up for it on the second turn. After that, I thought everything else was right on target. The lead change was good, and back on the other side, on the small slow (circle), he was not trying to go anywhere, not trying to do anything other than please me. The second stop, it was right on. And then the third stop was back on the right lead, which was a difficulty for him, and he was true again on the last stop. He’s the kind of horse that in the stops, he really likes to shape. He really likes to naturally put his head and his body in a real round arc. And so you’ve kind of got to give him a lot of rein because he really puts his head down in the stop. You’ve got to let him use his own balance. I couldn’t be more pleased … what we asked for him to do today, he said “yes,” and that’s pretty pleasing. He doesn’t want to make a mistake. He doesn’t want to be in trouble. He gets worried if he thinks he did something wrong.
Q: So it has been five years since he has qualified for the World Show, and he’s 12 now. What was it like to bring him back? Casey: I remember him as a 3-year-old, and I actually tried to buy him. … Horses are like tires in the reining. The more mileage you put on them, the more they wear out, the more they don’t drive as well. And so it’s a difficult chess game sometimes when they get to be an aged horse like him – keeping them mentally right, physically right and not have old habits override what you want them to perform like. He has always been willing. We just did the best we could do and let it fall. We were fortunate, got lucky tonight, and we’re pretty happy.
Q: How is he mentally and physically? Casey: Awesome. Physically, it’s like most of us horse trainers getting out of bed in the morning. It’s a little stiff for him. He takes quite a bit of warmup, he takes quite a bit of work. After this, he’s going to go to the water treadmill (therapy) for a couple of months, and that’s the right thing for him. We had already chosen that for him before we ever showed him. And so just a lot of mileage there. But mentally, he’s a great horse.
Q: How long have you had him? Casey: I got him after the first of the year. He was at (AQHA Professional Horseman) Gene Parker’s in North Carolina. He called me to see if we’d be interested in trying to show him again. Cecilia has some mares that she breeds to him, (and she wanted) to try to resurrect and make the public breed to him and know what we know about that horse. (To do that), you’ve got to go show again, prove it to them. So he sent him to us, and we tried to target this show. We only showed him a few times, we schooled him some, and this was our target.
Q: Has he more or less been in retirement for a few years? Cecilia: He has. I sent all my stallions to Gene, and Gene took a look at him and he said, “There’s some more left to this horse.” So he asked me if he could call Casey, and I said sure. And Casey said yes, send him on. So the best call ever made!
Q: Tell me what his personality’s like Cecilia: You wouldn’t even know he’s a stallion. He is more interested in candy and the wrinkling of the candy wrappers than mares. You forget he’s a stallion. He has the sweetest disposition, and he’ll pass that on to his babies, the natural ability. He has exceeded my expectations.
Q: How many peppermints has he already had today? Cecilia: I don’t know, I’ve lost count! Casey: Everybody in the barn feeds him. Everybody that comes by, you can’t walk by his stall where he doesn’t whinny or say “I’m here.” He is a hambone in that regard. I didn’t realize that he was such a treat hound.
Q: Cecilia, what was it like for you to watch Casey go first, and then you had to sit there and wait on everyone else to go? Cecilia: I saw his run, and I thought, “This is brilliant. This is a really, really great run.” There were some in there that I thought, “Oh, this is going to be it. They’re going to knock him out of the running.” But it didn’t happen, very fortunately for us.
Q: But you guys had a great run. Cecilia: Oh, he opened him up. He showed him just, oh, my God, it made cold chills run up my back.
Q: Now, Cecilia, you’ve had horses in other events here? Cecilia: I have a western pleasure mare; she was seventh. I have a performance halter stallion; he was world champion. So it has been a nice time for us.
Q: What did you guys think of the music they played with your run? Casey: In the prelims, they played that song (by Simon & Garfunkel) again. And so I heard it in the prelims. I think it’s a good thing as long as it’s a background music. If it’s too loud, I think it overrides the crowd involvement, enjoying a good run. For him, it fit. When I was showing, I could hear it. I knew it was going on. It was cool.
WINNER STATS
Horse name: Slip Slydun Away Pedigree: 1996 bay stallion by Mister Slydun Pine x Cowgirls Cody by Scooper C Poco Exhibitor: Casey Hinton of Whitesboro, Texas Owner: Cynthia May Hylton of Gainesville, Virginia Trainer: Casey Hinton Breeder: Terry Glassford, Galena, Ohio
Total class entries: 52 Purse: $54,958.80
World Champion Prizes: Custom-designed gold-tone trophy, Montana Silversmiths buckle, neck wreath, gold medallion, Cripple Creek-logo jacket, world champion patch, Tex Tan product, Justin Boots
