4-3-09

This story is the story of a racehorse.

This horse was owned by West Point Thoroughbred Inc. He was born in Kentucky and made his way to California.

Yes, he was a beautiful boy. Simply gorgeous and an amazing athlete.

The West Point Thoroughbreds wrote an article about one of his races that he had won. The article follows:

"Horse racing does not give points for style, but Esoteric Thinker certainly showed a flair for the dramatic in the MSW race on June 1st getting up in the absolute final stride to break his maiden at Golden Gate Fields. Esoteric Thinker was sharp early sitting a little closer to the pace than normal after breaking from the far outside post. He settled nicely down the backstretch and began inching closer on the turn for home. He continued his run into the stretch but then had to wait behind the tiring leaders at the eighth pole. It looked like he might lose a lot of momentum, but Esoteric Thinker showed a lot of heart. Russell Baze shifted Esoteric Thinker out at the sixteenth pole, and Esoteric Thinker came again hard to get up by a nose in the shadow of the wire. O.J. Jauregui said, "That was a heart stopper. The horse was training great going into the race. I knew we would run well, but we almost got a little unlucky. We had to wait in the stretch and I thought it might cost us, but Russell (Baze) did a great job getting the horse going again. We were a little more involved early, and the horse showed a lot of heart. He never stopped trying, and he showed the will to win. He came back from the race even better than when he went into it. He cooled out great, and he was full of himself back in the barn. He ate up, and you could see he felt good about himself." Russell Baze said, "I thought I was on the best horse, so I tried to give him the cleanest trip possible. The ten hole is tough going a mile, but the horse came back to me very nicely. He settled then responded when I asked him. We had a little trouble, but when I asked the horse he kept giving me what he had. He was dead game." Esoteric Thinker earned $16,500 for the win. He came out of the race superbly, we will look for an "a other than" allowance for him later in June."

His last recorded race that we can find was at Santa Rosa on July 26, 2008 where he was claimed for $6,250. In October of 2008 he found himself at a livestock auction. After the auction Tawnee was looking around trying to see if any of the kb's were loading up horses, and the only one she could spot was this great big off the track TB. With a little bargaining with the kb, this big guy was unloaded from the kb's trailer into the safety of Norcal's trailer. Yes he really did have 3 saddles on its back.

Once arriving at our rescue his feet were trimmed, he was evaluated and became available for adoption.

A wonderful individual stepped forward to give both "Cruzo" and Durham a wonderful home. They were taken to the vet to prepare for the long trip to their new home.

Back in Missouri the stalls were ready for Cruzo and Durham.

Finally the big truck made the long trip from Ca to the horses new home.

Cruzo was unloaded and took his first look around.

Cruzo and Durham were settled into their stalls for the first night at their forever home.

Both of these lucky horses are doing great today and their adopter could not imagine life without them. Both of these horses were purchased directly from KB's and would be dead today if we had not rescued them. The sad thing about racehorses is they can have fame and glory, turn around, and find themselves on death's door. Thankfully for these two their worries are over.