Tuna Surprise left Saratoga Racetrack a gangly two-year-old who had not shown one iota of talent for racing. His connections didn’t even bother to publish his one and only workout because it was so slow. Mind you, Tunny came from a first-rate racing outfit that knows how to prepare and condition racehorses. They just couldn’t get it out of him because it wasn’t there.
Tunny arrived here in mid-August 2024 unscathed from his time in racing. He was neither mentally nor physically damaged from the experience. I don’t put two-year-olds into our training program. Virtually no one wants a two-year-old because you can’t do a lot with them without causing damage. These days everyone is in a hurry to get them jumping or performing and you might get away with rushing a three-year-old or immature four-year-old, but you’re likely to pay for rushing a two-year-old by blowing his mind or blowing his body up. For these reasons, I throw them out in a field to allow them to enjoy being a horse and grow a little.
Throughout the winter, Tunny earned himself the reputation of being a big jerk. He didn’t see any reason he shouldn’t stop on the way to be turned out if he wanted to, and he would sneak bite you if you weren’t paying attention. A few of the people here decided he was going to be a handful to get going. I told them he was a normal, annoying two-year-old. I didn’t know a ton about his background, but I had heard the owner had taken him as a favor to a neighbor. Tunny didn’t act like he has been raised by professionals like many horses that come from the track. He acted like he had been someone’s pet, perhaps raised by someone who home-bred him.
March arrived and I had a spot in my training program so I decided to start Tunny. I began like I always do with the walk/halts in hand and lunging at the walk to teach them the voice commands for halt and walk before I get on him. Tunny proved he had some intelligence by picking up on cross tying and standing decently as I groomed and tacked him up. Before I get on a horse, I want to evaluate and develop their ability to pay attention to me. Horses naturally don’t need much of an attention span because they are reactive. They see or hear something, identify whether it’s threat, react by leaving the area or return to grazing. That can all be done in a matter of moments. When a horse comes up in racing, they aren’t required to pay attention to the rider or handler for very long. The riders and handlers at the track tell the horse what they want in an efficient manner and then leave them to perform. Add to that the fact that I had just turned him out for several months and I expected Tunny to have little to no ability to focus on me. However, there are some great things about being a home bred, and probably raised and handled by non-professionals. Tunny may need work on his manners, but he pays attention to me. He likes people and he had a really good ability to pay attention. That led to picking up the voice commands and responding to them in only three days.
I’m looking forward to getting on him this weekend.
If you want to learn about the walk/halts and intro to lunging, click here to see how I start them. I didn’t bother to cover that ground again since I’ve done it a few times. I’ll circle back if I get a horse that brings up some new issues, but if it goes smoothly, I don’t see any reason to post it.
