On the drive home from work, I slip a cassette into the dashboard stereo and listen to Chris Rea breathe "Texas" in his Englishman baritone.  It is one of those songs that eases the bends while decompressing into the real world and remind me of the Colleyville that used to be.

Before Ross Downs was no more than a titled subdivision, it was a horse racing track, and a training and proving ground for some of the nations' top speed horses.  World Champion Quarter Horses were fine tuned and many a bug boy learned his craft riding against veteran jockeys.  There was a posted
no-betting rule, but in the humble grandstand, it was not unknown for figures as high as $20,000. to be bet in a single wager on a favorite homebred.

Stables were competitive on race days but impromptu barbecues after chores in the evenings would gather stable hands, trainers, and owners with their
families who sat and told "reride" stories on one another.  People with names like Chili Red, Cotton, Skillet, Sleepy, Blondie Rocket, Trainwreck-all part
of an industry that requires only a lifelong calling-you have to be a Horseman.

Early mornings before light, the satisfying chewing sound of horses enjoying their oats, the scent of leather during tacking up, and hearing the rhythmic
hoofbeats coming closer down the frontside before the horses materialize as apparitions out of the groundfog-to not ever know these sensations is a life ignorant of the pleasures of the earthbound soul.

Now I drive around the curve on Colleyville Boulevard, just past Big Bear Creek, and no more is the red dirt track with the hillside barns.  Instead
there are houses, hundreds of houses with SUV's, pools, and a park named "Kimzey."  Even the hills have been recontoured.  Most of the streets are
named for elements from "Gone With The Wind," but a few-Beddo, McMakin, and our own Baker Ct., were named for trainers where our stables once stood.

The mighty Choyawon, now 26 years old and a bit deaf, ran his last race at Ross Downs.  Twice state Running Champion in Utah, he was legendary for being
the rare sort who could run in the first race, cool out by the third, and be the outrider's catch horse by the fourth.  At three, he paired with a
stablemate on the cutter races all winter and went on to Pocatello Idaho for the National Cutter Finals.  Our children learned to ride on the Red Menace with complete trust in his kind heart.  He earned his way and no greater accolade could be stated than to say they were well-mounted.  

Choyawon did slow down as he got older and very rarely, out of deference to his dignity, did we ask him to compete.  But this last time was important. We had a three year old colt in training that was nominated to a big derby in Colorado.  There are rules about getting accredited workouts going from a nonpari-mutuel state as Texas was then, to a pari-mutuel one.  This young stallion, who will be referred to as DS to protect his identity, would not have had enough time off between schooling races in Colorado to be eligible to run in the Derby.

However, a graded official race within a forty-five day window would mean the colt could be hauled to Gateway Downs without two punishing works.  But there arose a problem.  Not enough horses had entered the allowance race at Ross Downs to make it "go", and the Race Secretary would substitute another category to the card that would exclude our derby prospect.  So after some hustling around the backside, we found two more willing to enter, and put Choyawon in to make it eight.

As I said, Texas was still a place where betting was a a crime, so all the horsemen were actually running for was their own pooled money.  It was a two
hundred dollar entry fee plus jock mount and what we had in our account was in the low three digits.  Since our credo then (and sometimes now) was,
"something will come up", we swallowed hard and wrote the check.  Since this took up most of our money, the plan was for Choyawon to break slightly to the inside from the number eight post position-he was still a bonafide bullet from the starting gate, after all-and interfere just enough to allow an edge
for DS to charge as unimpeded as possible from the two hole.  Winning a race pumps up the confidence in a young horse and going for the win was as
important as collecting the purse.  We had engaged the services of Ross Downs leading rider on DS with the promise of a little extra above the percentage,
and it was no trouble finding a good jockey for Choyawon.

Well, to quote from the movie, "Way of the Gun", "a plan is just a list of things that didn't work out."

We all headed our own horses from the starting gate back then, and if you ever go to the Quarter Horse races, you owe it to yourself to watch at least
one race from the closest vantage point to the start allowed.  Locked and loaded, when the latches are tripped, that explosion of horses and race
riders will tear an exultant primal cry from the most jaded of thrill seekers.  This race was no exception.

Choyawon was shipped low and fast and a full length in front of the nextthree to his inside.  His jockey, a veteran like the big horse, arced him
over, intimidating numbers five, six and seven from a stampeding challenge. DS had the inside freeway to do his stuff.

Except that this day, the notorious Y chromosome that has ruined the illustrious futures of man and beast ever since Genesis, chose to inexplicably overpower the limbic section of the walnut size equine brain at the most inconvenient moment.  The colt leapt boldly on his first stride from
the gate, threw his head down, jammed all four legs in a prop, and bucked that leading rider so high, so hard that all the grandstand crowd could see
was a little helmeted man in white pants rising up flailing over the dust cloud left by the field of horses, and then descending again as it started to
clear.  DS continued to buck in a vigorous manner until he tired of it, looked around with wonder at where everyone could have gone, and the leading
rider thereupon caught him personally by the reins before the colt gave it much more mental digestion.  

There is a rule at every track and training facility about No Guns, and this would be Exhibit A for the rationale behind it.

Meanwhile our veteran rider sees he is all alone and still in front on Choyawon.  He has known this big sorrel gelding like an old friend for several years. He make the decision not to ask him for it out of respect,and does not even uncock his stick.  

But over on the rail-on the engine-comes charging Thirty-Eight Special, a match racing, open to the world, haint who can close like a tin siding
salesman-and he is blowing flames today with maybe a hundred yards to go. Choyawon, unblinkered, sees him coming before his jockey does, and today, opposite day at the track-the Mighty Choyawon has come to race.  He bunches himself up and POW-shoots forward to relaunch lost momentum.  Ears pinned back, the two horses are locked together stride for stride and sweep under the wire like they are pulling Ben Hur's chariot, to the screams of the fans in the grandstand.

I remember watching them pull up on the backside, tears in my eyes, praying successfully as it turned out, that the old guy didn't hurt himself with his
effort, and people clapping their hands wildly when the two horses returned to unsaddle.  The photo would take a long time, ultimately it was a dead
heat, but Choyawon's number came down for interference after the stewards
review.

No matter, Choyawon thought he had won, and that was his swan song on the race track.  We hauled DS to Colorado where Gateway Downs in Holly had been
repeatedly the victim of late spring snowstorms, and requirements for qualifying schooling and workouts were scaled back.  DS was able to run, finishing fourth out of 180 head entered, and paid back his debt to the family trust.  He stands today at stud in Colorado and is renowned as a sire
of even tempered rodeo stock.