2022 Thoroughbred Makeover Applications Open For Preview

Applications are now open for preview and drafting for the 2022 Thoroughbred Makeover!

As the application is redesigned for this year and also requires several additional pieces of information (including a signed letter from your veterinarian), we've added a preview and drafting period to the application process to allow you time to work without the pressure to submit.

Preview and start working on your application now at the Trainer Portal. Applications will be open for submission starting on Jan. 3, 2022 through Jan. 21 at close of business day.

Did you miss our live webinar last week about the application process for the 2022 Thoroughbred Makeover? Never fear — the recording is available to watch on-demand on our YouTube channel! 

Managing director Kirsten Green and Makeover show secretary Rayna Erasmus walk you through major rule and process changes for 2022 and answer questions along the way. Still have questions of your own that you'd like to get answered? Email Rayna at secretary@tbmakeover.org!

2021 Year-End Campaign Update
The RRP's board president Dr. Carolyn Karlson has issued a challenge: she'll match all donations through the end of the year up to $25,000, meaning that YOUR contribution to the RRP this season will be effectively doubled! We've raised $19,060 so far. Thank you to all who have contributed!

Our Giving Tuesday Facebook fundraisers were a big part of that total. Congratulations to our highest fundraiser Jody Busch! Jody earned $100 in RRP Store credit. We'd like to give a runner-up shout-out to Laurel Statz who came in second.

Can you help? There are many ways to support:

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2022 Thoroughbred Makeover Rulebook Now Available Online

The 2022 update of the rulebook for the Thoroughbred Makeover and National Symposium, presented by Thoroughbred Charities of America, is now available to be read online at TBMakeover.org! Print copies will be available for purchase at a later date.

Notable rule changes for 2022:

  • All applicants, regardless of past Makeover experience, must submit video no more than two years old demonstrating riding ability on the flat as well as any discipline-specific skills, such as a barrel pattern, cattle work, stick and ball work, or obstacle work. All applicants declaring expertise in a jumping discipline should furnish video demonstrating a course at 2'6” or higher. All video should be submitted on a more finished horse, not current Makeover hopefuls
  • All team members must submit an application. The application fee for team captains remains at $300; the application fee for team members is $150
  • Ribbons (1st-10th) and special awards will be awarded at a Friday night competitors' party based on preliminary competition. The top five in each discipline will return for Saturday's Finale, which will be judged on a blank slate and placed as separate championship event

The 2022 Thoroughbred Makeover Rulebook outlines all rules and information relevant to the competition, with changes for 2022 marked in red and clarifying information marked in blue.

Note the new schedule for applications!

Starting on Dec. 15, the trainer application will be available for preview and drafting at TBMakeover.org. You'll be able to work on your application and save your progress within the trainer portal.

Starting on Jan. 3, 2022, trainer applications can be submitted with all required additional documents (signed waiver, letter of recommendation from a vet, riding videos, and application fee), through end of business day on Jan. 21, 2022.

It's time: starting today, Dec. 1, 2021, horses may begin training for the 2022 Thoroughbred Makeover and National Symposium! As a reminder, eligible horses are Jockey Club-registered Thoroughbreds (or foreign equivalents) who marked a timed workout or raced on or after July 1, 2020 and do not have more than 15 retraining rides prior to Dec. 1, 2021.

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‘They Give You Their All’: OTTBs Becoming More Common In Western Disciplines

Off-track Thoroughbreds have developed increasing visibility across Western disciplines, according to horseandrider.com, thanks in part to the increasing popularity of the Thoroughbred Makeover which includes competition in ranch work, barrel racing, and competitive trail.

Dale Simanton of Belle Fourche, South Dakota, explained that  a fair number of ranchers have been riding their dual-purpose racehorses during winter ranch work for decades.

“Thoroughbreds probably have more natural cow in them than any Quarter Horse I've ever ridden,” Simanton told horseandrider.com. “If you get one that's about half scared of cattle, but still has the natural aggressiveness toward cattle that most horses have, then he'll never lose focus when working cows because he wants to know where that cow is at all times.”

Similarly, Richard Weber III of Ridgway, Colorado, likes Thoroughbreds for both ranch work and winter skijoring competitions—an event where a horse pulls a skier through obstacles.

“To say there's any task an OTTB can't do is crazy in my opinion,” said Weber. “Especially working up in the mountains, roping 50 calves in a day, and working a branding, that's where they shine. Thoroughbreds are like the Energizer Bunny, and I love that they have that marathon aspect to them.

“For me, to have a horse whose heart won't stop means everything. They don't quit you—they give you their all.”

Read more at horseandrider.com.

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Champion Whitmore Returns To Oaklawn With New Goal In Mind

Whitmore won Oaklawn's Hot Springs Stakes for older sprinters a record four times and if the feisty 8-year-old gelding cooperates, he'll be leading the field again in 2022.

Whitmore has returned to Arkansas, but instead of preparing for the Hot Springs, a race he won in 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020, the now-retired Eclipse Award winner is about to take baby steps toward a possible second career as a stable pony for Ron Moquett, who trained the gelding and campaigned him in partnership with Robert LaPenta and Head of Plains Partners (Sol Kumin).

“Our ultimate goal, right now, the short-term goal, is have him lead the post parade for the Whitmore,” Moquett said Tuesday morning. “That's our goal, Doesn't mean we're going to do it. It just means we're trying.”

Oaklawn announced in early September that it had renamed the Hot Springs to honor Whitmore, the 2020 Breeders' Cup Sprint winner, the country's champion male sprinter of 2020 and among the most popular and successful horses in Oaklawn history. The inaugural $200,000 Whitmore Stakes is March 19, a centerpiece of “Whitmore Day.” Oaklawn also renamed the Count Fleet barn, Whitmore's longtime home in Hot Springs, after the gelding.

Whitmore was retired after suffering a leg injury during a fifth-place finish in the $600,000 Forego Stakes (G1) Aug. 28 at Saratoga. A chestnut son of Pleasantly Perfect, Whitmore bankrolled $4,502,350 – 88th in North American history through Tuesday – after winning 15 of 43 starts. Much of Whitmore's best work came at Oaklawn, where he compiled a 9-6-1 record from 16 starts and earned $1,752,600. Whitmore also won Oaklawn's signature race for older sprinters, $500,000 Count Fleet Sprint Handicap (G3), a record three times (2017, 2018 and 2020). Swift Ruler, a local star during the 1960s, is the only other horse in Oaklawn history with seven career stakes victories.

Moquett said Whitmore was sent to Rebecca Maker's equine rehabilitation and breaking facility in Kentucky following the Forego. Whitmore has normally decompressed there the last several years before returning to Oaklawn – his winter home at every meeting since 2016 – to begin preparing for a new campaign.

Moquett said his wife/assistant Laura will be trying to re-train Whitmore for pony work, which encompasses escorting horses to and from the track during morning training hours. She was Whitmore's regular exercise rider.

“I have no idea,” Ron Moquett said, when asked if he believed Whitmore knows he's not running again. “This is kind of the same schedule he's been on. We're hoping he does. We're going to feed him different. Obviously, he's going to leave every day and come back.”

Moquett said Whitmore could eventually occupy his same stall in the renamed barn and be re-trained at Oaklawn or sent to more tranquil surroundings at the track's satellite training center about 25 miles east of Hot Springs, where the trainer keeps horses. Moquett said Whitmore left Kentucky Tuesday and is now at the training center. The gelding will return to Oaklawn after Thanksgiving, Moquett said.

Whitmore was a noted bad actor at two and gelded before his first start. Although he mellowed with age, Whitmore would buck and kick before loading into the starting gate for some races.

“We couldn't get him around the track as a 2-year-old, so he's changed a whole lot,” Laura Moquett said the morning after Whitmore won the 2020 Count Fleet. “We can actually train him now. He's softened his edges a little. He still has the tattoos of the barbed wire around his arm, but he has like a heart and mom on there as well now.”

Ron Moquett said Whitmore will now be going back to school, with his wife as tutor.

“Go out there and watch training,” he said. “Ride up there and sit there at the end of the day, when nobody's around, and watch a couple of horses train and then come back home. After a while, the hope is, he understands that this is what I do. I don't go train. Not go around kicking stuff. Laura will be on him. Laura's horse.”

Another former Ron Moquett trainee, Meanbone, successfully transitioned to pony work following his final career start in July 2020. Meanbone, a 9-year-old Silver Train gelding, worked as Moquett's stable pony during the 2021 Oaklawn meeting.

“We're just going to start like we did Meanbone,” Ron Moquett said. “Remember, he's a pony now and these other horses that we've re-homed and made ponies – we're going to try to do it with Whitmore and, hopefully, it sticks.”

Moquett said his wife would be aboard Whitmore to lead the post parade for the Whitmore Stakes, which is the final major local prep for the $500,000 Count Fleet Sprint Handicap (G3) April 16. Whitmore ran second in both 6-furlong races in 2021.

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