Don’t know what it’s you are looking for anybody to say. Even if it was the most inappropriate horse in the world and she the worst rider with no trainer help, she is not on here asking for our help.
You do say she is a nice and kind person, her riding is improving greatly and the 7 year old mare is quiet, sweet and has spent more then half of her working life in a job nowhere near a racetrack . Not seeing any kind of an issue requiring an opinion here, sounds like everything is going well for her. Sharing you think she was really bad, bad, bad a few months ago is meaningless and not so nice. No need to waste time and thought in how she is progressing. Other people’s horses and choices are other people’s business. Move along.
3.5 years off the track is a long time. The horse could easily be suitable for a beginner, or maybe it isn’t. Nobody here can answer anyway because nobody knows the rider, the horse, or the training program.
Why on earth would an OTTB that has had 3.5 years of retraining be any less suitable than any other breed with 3.5 years of training? There is no inherent quality of Thoroughbreds as a whole that makes them wholly unsuitable for beginners. There are plenty of quiet, forgiving, easy to ride thoroughbreds.
Eh, I have a coming 4yo OTTB that came to me fresh off the track. He is a SAINT. Literally one of the easiest horses I’ve ever had the pleasure of playing with. He showed all summer in Hunter Pleasure and carried kids around that had never sat on him prior to going into the ring. I trail rode him alone all over our 80 acres and he never put a hoof wrong. He then sat due to my schedule. I had a friend coming to look at him, so I picked the coldest, nastiest day to swing a leg over him after I had not sat on a horse in months. He could not have been better and I don’t think even an old Quarter Horse could have packed me around as safely. I also have his 1/2 brother (same sire), who is also a coming 4yo. We got him just a few months ago and he had not been handled at all since a yearling. He was tossed out in a field and had zero handling for over 2 years. We chased him on a stock trailer to pick him up and had to chase him off of it into our barn to get him in a stall. That was less than 4 months ago. He is currently trail riding solo, never needs a lunge, and naturally wants to go long and low. Some horses are born broke and both of these guys have that one-in-a-million disposition. I would NOT say they are ready for a beginner, but easily could be with another year of miles.
Do NOT discount Thoroughbreds as beginner horses. We’ve had some exceptional ones.
A horse 3 1/2 years off the track is not an OTTB. It is a thoroughbred that is good at what is doing, or a horse that needs a job change, or a better rider.
Why would it be? 3-4 years later the racetrack experience has little bearing on the horse’s current life or its abilities.
That OTTB was once a foal, too. But as it grew and changed, its description was updated to reflect its current status.
As someone said upthread, all of us oldsters grew up riding TBs, some off the track, some not. And we all survived which is why we’re still around to lecture the COTH younger generation.
If you are going for a TB makeover challenge yes. But if you were selling a 12 year old schoolmaster kids hunter that flunked out in race training at age 2 you wouldn’t advertise him as an OTTB. It’s no longer the biggest thing in his resume. Like you don’t call yourself a high school grad when you have a PhD.
Virtually all TB come through the race breeding pipeline, some flunk out of basic training and some after one or two races. Often those make mellow riding horses! So virtually all TB are OTTB.
But I think once a TB has settled into a new career they tend to get described as what they are now
Generally OTTB is used to describe a horses’ current level of training or most recent job. A TB who once raced but is currently a well established Show Hunter is referred to as a TB Show Hunter. OTTB does not describe the horse today or its job over the past years once retrained…except stereotypically and/or online. Fact I never heard or saw the term OTTB until we started abbreviating everything for texting and online chat rooms.
As previous poster brought up, it was a foal, weanling then a yearling a field for about 18-20 months. Longer then most of them stay ever on the track. If they ever get out of the 2 year old in training phase and start in a race,
So much depends on the horse, the rider and the trainer, and the combination of them all. I see that above me a lot of posters are defending the OTTB and even suggesting they should be re-labeled after x number of years of training. I think there are some that are sluggish and never had the drive or ambition to go, and those are the ones that cause the least concern. There are quite a few of these!
But there are the ones that did, indeed, run, were bred to run, ran a lot, and honestly still enjoy a good run around! Our barn had two of these types. One ran off with multiple very experienced and talented riders after two years of training. He was vet checked, nothing was found to be wrong, and he was turned out for a bit. He’s been sitting for a year being a horse. Trainer doesn’t want the liability of putting a student on him as he’s been extremely unsafe and unreliable. It was sad to see him sit after multiple riders endured his multiple sprints. He really needs to go to someone who won’t mind this erratic behavior and will rehab his mind, if possible. He just loves to run.
Another one was purchased for an intermediate teenage rider, and the family paid a LOT for him. They had him a month, and he started bolting when he spooked. The mom was terrified, but the kid loved the horse and wanted to keep with him. It happened a second time - mom said if it happens three times he needs to go. Well, it happened AGAIN and horse is now sadly for sale. Trainer is marketing him as a “precious children’s hunter.” Sorry, but a horse that is known to runaway with a child rider is not so precious. The original seller downplayed his OTTB status. In a case like this, where the horse has been off the track several years and the trainer can get him around to a reserve champion, I still think you owe it to the buyer to explain that the horse did formerly race. A parent should be able to choose if that is something they want to risk. This family was reassured by many, many people that the horse would be just fine, that’s it’s been years since he’s raced, etc… The issue was that he was always trainer ridden and was not ridden by an intermediate child.
I grew up with TBs, but they weren’t OTTB ones. They were bred to be hunters. And there is a huge difference. I hope all works out for the girl at your barn. At our barn, there is a crying child who is losing her special horse right around the holidays. My heart breaks for her.
I’ve experienced more unpredictable warmbloods than I ever have with Thoroughbreds. Both of my boys are by Brother Derek, who was a tough knocking racehorse and has put plenty of winners on the ground. My boys fully believe they are walking horses and prefer to meander along at a snails pace and have zero desire to run fast or expend too much energy. Both are brave to a fault and will make fantastic beginner horses with a little age and some miles.
Oh, and FYI - hubby works on horses full time and handles well over 2,000 horses per year. Hands down, his favorite horses to work on are always Thoroughbreds. He can reason with them and work through behavioral issues, where other breeds may be a bit more explosive.
OTTB is a new designation. I’m not sure why people need to throw that fact in every thread. I get it if the horse just came off the track but we see so many training issue threads or health care threads or heck this one that apply to so many horses yet somehow people think it’s different because the horse was bred to race or did race. My horse at one point was a terrible racehorse. I don’t refer to her as an OTTB. When people ask I simply say she’s a TB.
When people buy a horse trained in a different discipline, retrain it and put it up for sale they don’t advertise it as a former barrel racer or whatever. They advertise it as whatever it’s current job is.
Purpose bred TBs for sport and TBs that make it to the track have a lot in common on paper. Doesn’t change what the horse is doing now. I have never noticed a huge difference between purpose bred TBs and horses who hit the track. When there is a difference it’s because the person who first gets it from the track has no business retraining it.
As with any breed certain blood lines have been proven to be more ammy friendly. The TB is no different.
You seem to have the wrong idea about what racehorses do.
Yes, they are encouraged to run. But they are trained to run when asked. A horse that bolts, runs away, and cannot be controlled by its rider isn’t able to be a racehorse. It would be a safety hazard on the track just as much as it would be in a show ring. That kind of crazy is tolerated even less in a racing environment than elsewhere.
Your notion that the TBs in your examples are unrideable because they are OTTBs is misguided. It’s much more likely that improper training is to blame.
I have seen returning riders and juniors and ammies be challenged and even defeated by warmbloods Arabs quarter horses Andalusians and Morgans as well as by fresh OTTB.
What all these scenarios had was folks buying green horses for a bargain without the training skills or the trainer support to manage them. I live at the low end of nice horses where we all want a bargain so I see a lot of fallen through the cracks horses and unbroke adult horses etc. Many times they work out fine of course.
There are probably more people who have had their first horse be an off the track something than not if you were to actively go back in time and figure that out. The OTTB acronym is a double edged sword in my opinion. It has definitely helped increase the popularity of TBs as a whole and given people a subset of classes and shows that are open to them but it has also drug out some people whose best match in a horse would be a coin operated one. In the end, they are horses, horses who have a very strong work ethic and require a lot of calories which in turn create a lot of energy. Choose wisely, get a good trainer, turn them out and you will be fine.
There are probably more people who have had their first horse be an off the track something than not if you were to actively go back in time and figure that out. The OTTB acronym is a double edged sword in my opinion. It has definitely helped increase the popularity of TBs as a whole and given people a subset of classes and shows that are open to them but it has also drug out some people whose best match in a horse would be a coin operated one. In the end, they are horses, horses who have a very strong work ethic and require a lot of calories which in turn create a lot of energy. Choose wisely, get a good trainer, turn them out and you will be fine.
There are probably more people who have had their first horse be an off the track something than not if you were to actively go back in time and figure that out. The OTTB acronym is a double edged sword in my opinion. It has definitely helped increase the popularity of TBs as a whole and given people a subset of classes and shows that are open to them but it has also drug out some people whose best match in a horse would be a coin operated one. In the end, they are horses, horses who have a very strong work ethic and require a lot of calories which in turn create a lot of energy. Choose wisely, get a good trainer, turn them out and you will be fine.
There are probably more people who have had their first horse be an off the track something than not if you were to actively go back in time and figure that out. The OTTB acronym is a double edged sword in my opinion. It has definitely helped increase the popularity of TBs as a whole and given people a subset of classes and shows that are open to them but it has also drug out some people whose best match in a horse would be a coin operated one. In the end, they are horses, horses who have a very strong work ethic and require a lot of calories which in turn create a lot of energy. Choose wisely, get a good trainer, turn them out and you will be fine.
There are probably more people who have had their first horse be an off the track something than not if you were to actively go back in time and figure that out. The OTTB acronym is a double edged sword in my opinion. It has definitely helped increase the popularity of TBs as a whole and given people a subset of classes and shows that are open to them but it has also drug out some people whose best match in a horse would be a coin operated one. In the end, they are horses, horses who have a very strong work ethic and require a lot of calories which in turn create a lot of energy. Choose wisely, get a good trainer, turn them out and you will be fine.
so I see a lot of fallen through the cracks horses and unbroke adult horses etc. Many times they work out fine of course.