Supreme Race Horses
Supreme Race Horses
By Denis Blake
AQHA bestows a slew of racing honors each year, from the ultimate prize of the World Champion Racing American Quarter Horse trophy to dozens of state and regional high-point leaders. While the world championship has always been the sport’s most prestigious honor, the title of AQHA Supreme Race Horse grants the recipients entry into a club that is almost as exclusive.
Created by the AQHA Racing Council in 2002 and awarded retroactively to any qualifying horses before that point, the Supreme Race Horse award has been earned by just 122 horses.
Supreme Race Horse: Qualifications
To earn the award, a horse must:
- Earn $500,000.
- Capture two or more open Grade 1 stakes.
- Win at least 10 races during his or her career.
- For horses that raced prior to the introduction of the graded race system in 1983, a list of Grade 1-equivalent races was used. There were 72 horses that received the award retroactively.
Quick Facts About AQHA Supreme Race Horses
- Of the 122 Supreme Race Horses, 33 have taken home the hardware as world champion and 12 have been inducted into the American Quarter Horse Hall of Fame.
- AQHA Past President Jerry Windham pulled off a rare daily double as the owner of two (Indigo Illusion and Stolis Winner) and breeder of two (Azoom and Stolis Winner) Supreme Race Horses.
“It’s a really important award to me,” says Jerry. “It’s something that is below a world champion, obviously, but it’s still very significant.”
Vessels Stallion Farm LLC has also owned and bred two or more Supreme Race Horses, with Dashing Knud and Timeto Thinkrich carrying the California farm’s colors and Apollitical Time, Separate Bet and Moonist coming from the legendary breeding operation.
- Dash For Cash, a Supreme Race Horse himself, has sired eight winners of the award, including First Down Dash, who in turn has 11 sons and daughters that have won the award.
- Three mares have produced a pair of Supreme Race Horses: Runaway Wave, who produced Ocean Runaway and Wave Carver by First Down Dash; Twist A Fleet, the dam of Apprehend and Griswold by Merridoc; and Sizzling Lil, the only one to achieve the feat with two different stallions as the dam of Corona Chick by Chicks Beduino and Corona Kool by First Down Dash.
Speed and Soundness
Perhaps the most difficult part of achieving the status of Supreme Race Horse is the requirement to win 10 races. Winning two Grade 1 races or $500,000 certainly is no easy task, but clearing the first hurdle will generally take care of the second, and both can be achieved in a single season, or even at a single meet with a hot horse.
By contrast, making 10 visits to the winner’s circle in a single year is almost unheard of, especially with the reduced racing frequency of today’s runners. It’s not impossible, though, as Azoom won 11 races, two Grade 1 stakes and $738,136 in a single juvenile season in 2004.
And Easy Date nearly blazed through all the requirements in a period of barely six months when Walter Merrick’s Easy Jet filly won 12 times as a 2-year-old in 1974, including the Grade 1-equivalent Kindergarten and All American futurities, and banked just short of $500,000 before hitting that mark the next season. But in today’s racing world, a horse almost certainly has to be on the track for two years to compile that many wins, so durability and soundness are major factors.
With only 118 Supreme Race Horses in the history of American Quarter Horse racing, chances are slim that many breeders or owners will experience the thrill of having more than one.
Even for a prolific breeder and owner like Windham, the Supreme Race Horse award can be elusive. Windham summed up the dreams of any horseman, “I wish I could get more of them.”