Long hours. Steep hills. Cold days.
Like all Mid-Atlantic based horse trainers this winter, Russell Haynes endured. Temperatures dropped. Snow fell. Ground froze. Then it warmed up. And rained. Ground sunk. At every sign of reprieve, oppression would come again. It was an arduous winter. Especially when you’re 26, training the first horse under your name, when you’re missing your dad who’s been gone six years, when you’ve talked your mother and friends into believing, when the Virginia Gold Cup is miles and months away and you’re 100-1 to make it, 10-1 even if you do.
Then the first Saturday in May rolls around and within 4 miles, the winter’s toil is washed away with flawless jumping and a stamina-enriched burst of speed. Hot Rize made it all worth it. Owned by a syndicate named after Haynes’ Tennessee homestead, Holston Hall, trained by Haynes and ridden by leading jockey Willie McCarthy, Hot Rize upset the $75,000 timber classic with a last-to-first rally May 3. The 10-year-old homebred reeled in Organisateur late to notch his third timber win over two and a half seasons. Sent off as the second-highest price in the field of nine, Hot Rize handled the winners of the Virginia Gold Cup, International Gold Cup, Grand National, Mason Houghland and New Jersey Hunt Cup.
“It’s starting to sink in,” Haynes said, a week after the victory. “It’s still hard to believe, especially after this winter, I didn’t think we’d make it to Radnor much less win the Gold Cup.”
Radnor comes two weeks after the Gold Cup and Hot Rize isn’t going. He’s done what he set out to do.
Haynes amicably took over the training of Hot Rize from trainer/friend Teddy Mulligan this winter. Mulligan closed his barn and move to Seattle and is getting ready to go to farrier school. Haynes had assisted Mulligan with Hot Rize and figured he’d get the horse going this winter and decide on a trainer. Then he decided on himself.
“I thought I would initially get him legged up and weigh my options and see if I could come up with somebody good to send him to in the spring,” Haynes said. “As time wore on, I felt like, ‘I think I know this horse better than anybody, why not take a shot and do it myself?’ “
Haynes started with a couple of foxhunters, a 3-year-old filly and Hot Rize at the Watermans’ farm near Upperville, then moved to a farm off The Plains Road, between Middleburg and The Plains.
“It was a tough decision, it was a big commitment and a lot of responsibility with a horse like him, I always felt like he was special,” Haynes said. “I just felt in my gut I could do what needed to be done. I asked the partners and my mom and they said go for it and it all worked out in the end.”
The 10-year-old son of Sultry Song had hinted at big things over his 24-race career. It began with Russell’s father, Bruce, who sent him out to his debut as a 3-year-old in Camden in 2007, he was beaten 30 lengths by Be Certain. Bruce died two months later and, in time, Hot Rize moved through a collection of trainers as Mike Berryman, Karen Gray and Mulligan procured decent races from the bay gelding. For Gray, he won a maiden claimer at Aiken in 2011 and followed it with a timber score at Camden three weeks later.
Hot Rize went winless in three starts in 2012 before relocating to Mulligan’s barn for the 2013. Hot Rize won at Middleburg, just missed at Radnor and finished third in the Pennsylvania Hunt Cup. In between, he was beaten double digits in the Virginia Gold Cup, Chronicle Cup and at Camden last fall.
Along the way, Russell rallied Ryan Broyles, Rob Banner, Bobby Kirk, Charlie Nulsen and Brian Ferrell to form Holston Hall in conjunction with him and his mother.
All celebrated in the Virginia Gold Cup winner’s circle.
Make a plan. Work the plan.
Originally aimed at Old Dominion, Hot Rize missed that start and prepped on the flat at Loudoun Hunt Point-to-Point April 23, finishing second with Russell aboard before prepping again with a timber spin, finishing sixth, at the Grand National.
“He’s always been a nice horse, it’s been a little bit of tough luck and he’s a late maturing type, it’s taken him 10 years to get his big win. I always thought he had a decent turn of foot, he’s got a lot of heart and I felt like if I could get him right, there wasn’t a timber horse in the country that I would want to trade places with,” Haynes said. “I knew I had him right, but the looming question was did I have him right to get 4 miles and especially in the deeper going. That’s what had knots in my stomach all day on race day.”
McCarthy quelled those knots with patience and precision.
McCarthy dropped Hot Rize to the back and simply bided his time as Chess Board set the pace. Worried Man, Illustration, Straight To It and Grinding Speed settled behind the leader. Organisateur, Spencer Road and Old Timer tracked them. Hot Rize settled in last. Cutting left to the water jump the final time, Chess Board led by a half-length from the outside, Worried Man sparred from the inside, Straight To It and Organisateur jumped between them. Grinding Speed stalked just off their heels, Illustration was still pitching, Spencer Road and Old Timer loomed. Still Hot Rize tracked, by himself, but only three lengths off the lead.
The first five picked up at the next fence where Chess Board lost Ross Geraghty. Down the dip, Organisateur and Jody Petty swept to the lead, opening up a daunting margin around the final turn. McCarthy, still waiting like he was sipping hot chocolate on the back porch, moved Hot Rize into a looming position turning toward the final two fences. At the second-to-last, Organisateur led over the inside panel while Hot Rize crept into it over the outside panel. Grinding Speed, Old Timer and Straight To It hung in the middle. Hot Rize drifted left and jumped the last within a panel of Organisateur and Grinding Speed. Organisateur jumped it adequately, Grinding Speed hit it hard rocking Mark Beecher to the knot and Hot Rize hit it as well, pitching McCarthy but recovering like a cat off a couch. After the last, Hot Rize wore down a game Organisateur to win by three quarters of a length. Old Timer passed Grinding Speed to finish third.
Great Meadow on the first Saturday in May is a long way from The Plains Road on the first Monday in January.
“You would be shocked if I showed you the places where we got the Gold Cup horse fit, just hills where I do interval work and we foxhunted him some. I think you have to just put in time, especially with the older horses,” Haynes said. “This puts wind in your sails. It’s the highs that get you through the multitude of lows. Even on the bad days, this was always the goal. I remember going into Tri County in my rain gear, it was pouring, and the girl asked me if was going to ride in this, and I said, ‘We can’t miss days if we’re going to win the Gold Cup.’ “
At the end of the day, Haynes still had work to do.
“It’s been a one-man show all spring,” Haynes said. “My friends were calling me to celebrate and I told them, ‘I’m cleaning stalls but I do have a bottle of champagne.’ “
And a Gold Cup.
