Article by Blanche Schaefer
These top Equi-Stat magic crosses have consistently produced the winningest horses in barrel racing.
There’s no guaranteed recipe for success when it comes to breeding winning barrel horses. However, certain bloodlines crossed on each other have proven time and again to place the odds on the favorable side of producing winners. In this exclusive Equi-Stat report, we examine the top all-time producing magic crosses, headlined with no surprises by No. 1 Dash Ta Fame on Frenchmans Guy mares, No. 2 Frenchmans Guy on Dash Ta Fame mares, and No. 3 PC Frenchmans Hayday on Royal Shake Em mares. We also dive into the story behind one of the most consistent producers of the Frenchmans Guy x Dash Ta Fame magic cross, Myers Performance Horses’ grey Dash Ta Fame mare Disarray.
Note: While Equi-Stat began tracking barrel racing earnings in 1985, the statistical division of Cowboy Publishing Group did not begin tracking professional rodeo earnings consistently until 2010; therefore, some stallions’ offspring earnings are more than reflected in Equi-Stat.
Perfectly Planned Disarray
How the Dash Ta Fame daughter Disarray has impacted Bill and Deb Myers’ breeding program couldn’t be more opposite of what her name implies. The 2002 gray mare was bred and raised by Robert Driggers and earned $17,870 on the track, but that’s not the only thing that drew the Myers’ attention in 2006 when they approached the renowned New Mexico racehorse breeder about buying her.
“I really liked her conformation, and she was a daughter of Dash Ta Fame, which was a big asset,” Bill said. “That mare family she came from was a real prominent mare family that the Driggerses have had tremendous success with on the racetrack. We study mare families a lot, and they’re hugely important to a breeding business. I feel her mare family is a big part of why she’s been such a great producer.”
Disarray’s dam, Rimes Bouquet, a 1995 Quarter Horse by Rime and out of Real Karates by Real Thing, has a pedigree laced with flat-track speedsters and boasts a speed index of 101. She ran out more than $38,000 on the track and is a producer of racehorses earning nearly $200,000. Disarray herself has an 89 SI and is beautifully conformed, a trait Bill believes is as crucial as a proven pedigree.
“She’s a real balanced mare. Big, long, sloping shoulder, a real nice topline, real nice neck that went into her shoulders correctly, short back with a good wither, a long hip on top running down her leg,” Bill said. “The mare has a lot of bone, she’s straight, she’s cinched really deep. She is a good, heavy-bodied mare that is still real breed-y looking. Pedigree is important in all facets of the horse world, but we try to be very strict on conformation on our mares and studs. If you have families of horses that have been successful, usually they’ve had to be pretty sound-made horses. Conformation is huge in our program, and that mare really fit our requirements of great conformation.”
Disarray stands out among Dash Ta Fame daughters as one of the top-producing mares when crossed on the Myers’ stallion, Frenchmans Guy. When the first pairing between the two, Guys Famous Girl, hit the arena in 2011, she found immediate success, winning the LG Pro Classic Slot Race with Angela Gilliam and finishing the year as the highest-earning futurity horse in the nation.
Disarray has produced Equi-Stat earners of $269,430, such as Tiffany Schuster’s futurity and rodeo winner Famous Mic Guy Ver and Toni Dixon’s proven winner Guys R A Mystery. With six performing offspring, her progeny average $44,905 in earnings.
“When you get consistently good traits, that’s what allows those horses to do what they have done,” Bill said. “If you’re getting those same conformation traits and that same mind, you’re getting consistently good horses. It costs so much to breed horses that you look for consistent families that give you consistent desirable traits. When you make your living doing this, that’s what you’re trying to get.”
The ability to consistently produce winners is not common among mares.
“The unique horses like that, you’re so appreciative of them when you get them. They don’t come along in big bunches. Out of our probably 30 mares we have, we don’t have over seven or eight superstar producers,” Bill said. “We’ve got a lot of really good mares who have produced and done well, but those superstar producers and crosses are a smaller number. Disarray is our top mare. You don’t have five or 10 of those kinds of mares.”
The mare’s colts by Frenchmans Guy have tremendous value that’s reflected in the sale prices each year at the Myers Performance Horse Sale. As 2-year-olds, Guys Famous Girl topped the sale in 2009 for $68,000, Famous Mic Guy Ver brought $62,000 as the highest-seller in 2017, and 2020’s highest-seller Hez Famous Guyz sold for $80,000, not to mention the colts the Myerses have sold privately. Several have also changed hands for well into six figures once proven in the arena.
“I bet we’ve sold close to $400,000 worth of colts out of that mare, easily,” Bill said, also noting two other prospects by A Smooth Guy and Ima Special Kindaguy sold for $40,000 each. “We’ll sell them for what we’d sell two or three other colts combined. Their value has become such a great commodity, because there’s been so many of them win, and that bloodline has a track record. It’s all about numbers when you’re trying to make a living. The less horses you can sell for more money, the better. As we see the industry changing, people are willing to give a considerable amount of money for what they feel is the best of the top-of-the-line horses in our industry. That drives us to try to breed those types of horses.”
Originally published in the February 2021 issue of Barrel Horse News.
