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I'm Glad I Found You III
Original article written by Carolyn Eaton posted 8 years 1 week agoSince I loved the first two of the series – I decided I would add my own chapter as I close in on my 9th real time year and 25th Sim Year anniversary (I started in Year 17).
I started the Sim, played with enthusiasm by my best friend Laura Ferguson, during a fairly terrible time in my life. I had a horrible job that was burning me out, but felt trapped by debt from a failed business and three mortgages. The Sim gave me a completely different outlet, and offered a distraction from the job.
The Sim was very different then, no gallops, no works with equipment – you had to figure out equipment from running lines, and could run with more than two pieces (yes, and run uphill both ways in bare feet).
Steeplechasing started shortly after I joined the Sim. Chasing had been a passion of mine from growing up in the Piedmont area of Virginia, and gave me my first big Sim runner – Aziz Amir. As a flat runner he earned about $14,000 in claimers. The he became a chaser and won first out (oh – and you couldn’t “teach a horse to jump” – you pulled the trigger to make them a chaser, then ran them in a steeplechase) in “The Game Spirit Chase” and over the next four Sim years won $640,000 for me. A pretty awesome $10 purchase for a newbie.
When I started, horses were born as yearlings. I invested a fair amount of game points to buy “real life” mares and bought Prima Beauty. Her first foal was my first millionaire and first Simmy winner– and the first horse I owned that others watched – Thomas Jefferson, aka “TJ”. I have bred and owned several other top horses in the Sim, but there’s nothing like the first.
Since I live in Texas, and the real life Texas breeders program is – technically in existence but little more than that, I decided I could use the Sim to build one. I started with dirt sprinters, then moved on to turf in all three divisions. I breed some horses specifically for those races, trying to make sure I have at least one horse for each TX bred turf race. I win one or two of them most weeks, but not always, since, as intended – once I built it, others were come. There are now 17 turf sprint, 8 turf miler, 22 turf router, and 25 dirt sprint studs now standing in Texas.
I have had many successes over the years, and most who look at my stable would say I had more good years than bad. I have had a lot of luck, but I have also put in a lot of time understanding bloodlines and nicks. Breeding is where I enjoy my time the most. I could do a lot better at race placement. I am extremely methodical about training. To keep the Sim fun and keep it from being a chore I rarely have more than 100 runners (about 40% 2 year olds), and around 80 broodmares. With a stable that size, I don’t have the starts to get the huge numbers of wins and stakes wins, but too big (and too many project horses) to be a super select stable with a phenomenal win%, so you won’t see me up for top trainer or breeder. It is getting the most out of each horse I run, then planning the NEXT crop, that dream for the future, that keeps me playing.
So Sim, as I campaign through this year and the ones to come, I’m glad I found you.