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PEPTO & MRS.
HALL |
By Katie Tims
That evening, they walked out to the pasture
together. Partners. In the fading evening light,
they inspected mares, discussed possibilities
and watched babies. A new crop. A new set of
circumstances.
A group of four foals, three full siblings and a
half brother, needed finality. One could be
registered. The others would spend their lives
minus official documentation. So difficult to
pick just one. All with royal blue blood, two
colts, two fillies but only one voted most
likely to succeed. A gamble.
Elaine Hall remembers the conversation with her
husband, Larry, now deceased.
"It's time to make a decision," Larry said,
bluntly.
"Well gosh," Elaine responded, "it's too hard to
really get a stud that's going to really win and
be a big-time stud. I think I would stick with a
mare."
Lingering a moment longer, just to be sure, the
couple then turned and walked back to the house.
It was getting late. Once inside, Larry went
directly to his office, alone. He pulled out an
AQHA registration application off the desk and
paused. Thinking. Considering. He popped the cap
off the pen then leaned down to write one word -
Peptoboonsmal.
"I said, fine, let's go for it!" Elaine
remembered saying about her husband's decision.
"We agreed that if we're ever going to raise a
great stud, this was it."
Peptoboonsmal was supposed to be something
wonderful. He was by Peppy San Badger, the No.
1-leading cutting horse sire of all time. His
mother was the Halls' favorite mare, Royal Blue
Boon, the leading cutting dam of all time.
Just naming the colt was quite a process.
Looking through magazines, Elaine kept her eye
peeled for ideas that could be transposed,
combining Peppy and Boon into a creative, yet
logical order. A soothing solution solved the
puzzle.
"I presented Peptoboonsmal to Larry and at first
it took him aback," Elaine said. "He had to see
it in print, then in writing and then we
reprinted it again. Then I just flat said, 'If
you don't like it, cross it off the list!' "
What began as a lucky pick with a funny name
resembling a popular pink stomach remedy turned
into a shooting star, a celestial burst of red
roan that washed the cutting pen in frosted
coats, sheer talent, incredible trainability and
ultra-cooperative minds. The pink-tinted wonder
called Peptoboonsmal is the result of the
unwavering faith of a man, a trainer's
consistency and the resolute tenacity of a
woman. Together, they just may have made a
legend.
Peptoboonsmal has the double luxury of a
performance record and a two-crop breeding
resume that knocks a cutter's socks off. He won
the 1995 NCHA Futurity with Gary Bellenfant and
his offspring have scrawled thick, bold marks
across major aged events in multiple
disciplines.
The first class of Peptoboonsmal cutters hit the
2000 NCHA Futurity and accumulated $162,575 in
winnings divided among 21 entries. The 2001
Futurity witnessed an incredible 66
Peptoboonsmal offspring. The only stallion that
came close to having that many was fellow
Futurity Champion CD Olena that had 60 colts
entered. After the first two rounds, 11
Peptoboonsmal horses made the Open semifinals,
including Hes A Peptospoonful, the stud that won
round one, round two and the semis.
A quarter of the horses in the 2001 Open finals,
six of the 24, were Peptoboonsmal progeny. These
talented cutters worked their way to $337,549 in
that one round alone. Hope Justice rode Freckles
Lena Boon to the Open finals, plus scored a 210
in the Non-Pro finals, after she lost a cow in
the last few seconds. The pair eventually scored
its justified 225 at the Abilene Spectacular and
won the Non-Pro Derby.
Taking all the 2001 NCHA Futurity finals into
account - the Open, Non-Pro, Amateur, Limited
Open and Limited Non-Pro, those second crop
Peptoboonsmal dollars passed the $375,800 mark.
Numbers that boggle the mind and hint at what's
to come.
Crop one
"To go win the Futurity is a miracle," Elaine
said.
Regardless, Elaine and Larry directed the young
Peptoboonsmal toward the big event. Since 1979,
the Halls had immersed themselves in the sport
of cutting and in 1984, their mare, Boons
Sierra, won the Open Futurity Reserve
Championship with John Tolbert and then took the
Open at the 1985 Super Stakes.
Under Bellenfant's tutelage, the young
Peptoboonsmal honed his cow work skills and
showed pizzazz early. A great sire, however,
does not talent alone make.
"We knew before he ever went to the Futurity
that he was a very, very competitive horse,"
Elaine said. "We knew he was a great athlete and
a very good-minded horse, but you never know if
they're a great stud until they put something on
the ground."
Ironically, the Halls had no clue that their
promising 2-year-old was already working on his
siring expertise. Early that year, a determined
Peptoboonsmal jumped the fence to romance a mare
in the adjoining pasture. She was a no-name
recipient mare without papers, a large girl with
probably a little Thoroughbred here and a little
Quarter Horse there. Nonetheless, she was the
first proud mother of a Peptoboonsmal baby.
The Halls' "accident horse," Peptos Roany Pony,
turned out to be Peptoboonsmal's sole 1995 foal.
The mare shined at the 1998 NCHA Futurity when
she made the Open semifinals with David
Holtsford and the Non-Pro semis with Jay Hall,
Larry and Elaine's son. She eventually earned
$19,743 in NCHA money and now belongs to Linda
Holmes, Longmont, Colo.
"My son told me now I could advertise that 100
percent of his first foal crop went to the
semifinals," Elaine said with a laugh.
If that was what Peptoboonsmal had to offer with
a mare from across the tracks, imagine what he
could produce with a lady from his side of
cutting town.
Crop two
The stallion tended 1995 business by winning the
NCHA Futurity's $100,000 Championship and
scribing his name solidly among legends. Proving
he had performance longevity, Peptoboonsmal then
rounded out the 1996 season with $80,487 in
winnings at six shows. At the NCHA Summer
Spectacular, he won the two Open rounds and the
semis but wound up 10th in the finals. That was
his last show.
"He had done everything he needed to do," Elaine
said. "He was so consistent in winning and he
had plenty of championships for the short time
he'd been shown."
Between the April Super Stakes and the July
Derby, Peptoboonsmal bred approximately 50
mares. This batch was the Futurity class of 2000
and included horses that have so far earned
quite a name for themselves: Pepto Taz (DNA);
$84,489; Mylanta Lena ($71,979); Yellow Roan Of
Texas ($71,547); Bet Yer Boons ($66,543);
Peptotime ($52,260); War Paint Pepto (PT)
($46,319); and Smart Peptolena ($37,139). Kick
in the rest of his many money earners, and the
total figure for the 1997 crop stands at over
$481,000 in earnings.
Retiring Peptoboonsmal coincided with tragedy.
In May, just before the Derby, Larry passed
away. As Elaine continued through a murky fog of
grief, she kept her stallion's path crystal
clear. Not once did she consider syndication.
Lifetime breeding shares was an option she
ignored.
"I could have fallen off the end of the earth
into self-pity or I could have sold the horse
and gone off to Hawaii somewhere," Elaine said.
"This horse was our dream come true and that is
not what Larry would have wanted me to do."
She had the confidence to market the horse
although her steps were unsteady at first.
Immediately after Larry's death, Elaine received
a phone call from Randle Tune, a horse buyer and
seller from Gainesville, Texas. He told her she
needed to carry on and market Peptoboonsmal.
"I'll never forget the conversation," Elaine
said. "This man had never met me, ever, but he
encouraged me, he inspired me and he made me
excited about it."
The next spring, with his fee set at $3,000,
Peptoboonsmal bred over 100 mares.
Crop three
"When I saw his name on top, I just went
swirling. I could not believe it!"
Elaine had just taken a look at the sire count
for the 2001 NCHA Futurity. She knew 1997 had
been his biggest year for breeding, but the huge
number of Peptoboonsmal offspring at Fort Worth
floored this stallion owner. Seeing all those
big-name trainers listed alongside Peptoboonsmal
horses was whipped cream on her sweet Futurity
pie.
When nearly 20 percent of those Peptoboonsmals
made it back to the semis and six qualified for
the finals, Elaine was as pleased as a stallion
owner could possibly be.
"I just told everybody I was dancing with the
roan roses," she said.
Already, the 2001 fall months had been quite a
year for Elaine's stallion. Boonlight Dancer
crossed the cutting boundary and won the NRCHA
Snaffle Bit Futurity's $100,000 Championship
with Todd Bergen, then went on to make a strong
showing at the NRHA Futurity. Evita Theroan was
the high seller at the NRHA Breeders Showcase
Sale - just one among the many Peptoboonsmal
offspring demanding stellar prices. Pretty In
Pink and Lloyd Cox took the Open at both the Sun
Coast Futurity and the Brazos Bash. Timely Boon
and Dustin Adams won the Sun Coast Futurity's
Non-Pro Division. Time For Pepto was first in
the UCHA Non-Pro Cutting Futurity with Sherry
Chamberlin and Reserve Champion in the Open with
Tim Castilaw.
Bayboonsmal, a rare sorrel daughter, won the
Open Southern Futurity with Sam Shepard in the
saddle.
This was all good news, but the overwhelming
success at the cutting Futurity surpassed
Elaine's optimistic dreams.
"Royal Blue Boon had been proving it all along,
that she had the genetics so strong," Elaine
said. "I never really had a doubt in my mind
that he was going to be a sire, but the first
year to do that great; I was just astounded."
Crop four
It almost never happened.
At 7 p.m. on Memorial Day, 1998, Elaine received
a worried phone call from Dr. Marlon Baker, the
veterinarian who owns and operates Alpha Equine,
the Granbury, Texas, breeding facility where
Peptoboonsmal stands.
"I'll never forget," Elaine said. "He said,
'Elaine, don't come down here. I don't want you
see Pepto like this. We are trying to load him;
I don't know that he'll survive the trip to A&M,
but I'm taking him there myself.'"
The same stallion that had gotten four mares in
foal that very day had lost his equilibrium and
was going downhill fast. Three weeks of
intensive care at Texas A&M yielded no answers.
Talk of EPM (Equine Protozoal Myeoencephalitis)
made the rounds, but Dr. Baker was not
convinced. No closer to a cure, the vet loaded
Peptoboonsmal into the trailer and drove to the
University of Washington in Pullman, Wash.,
where he had access to an MRI machine large
enough to accommodate a full-grown horse.
Faith carried Elaine through this tragic period.
"My Larry was so sick and suffered so much that
when Pepto got sick, I think I had been through
so much that I knew that whatever God put on me
I could handle," she said.
But nothing prepared her for the heartbreaking
news. The MRI images shed light on a
marble-sized abscess embedded deep in
Peptoboonsmal's brain. It was inoperable and
could not be removed.
"I don't even know where my mind went at that
time," Elaine remembered. "I guess I just never
expected for them to say that. I expected them
to say that they didn't find anything; he was
going to be fine."
Pooling Dr. Baker's expertise with that of vets
from across the nation, a course of action was
charted. The abscess was bacterial in nature and
thus required strong antibiotics that could
penetrate the blood/brain barrier. Peptoboonsmal
returned to Texas, where Dr. Baker tubed him
twice a day for two months. The horse seemed to
improve.
When the stallion returned to Washington for a
follow-up MRI, the X-ray showed scarring but no
abscess. Later investigation explained that a
tiny germ, one that entered through his nostril,
had been responsible for the life-threatening
abscess. Even though the stallion regained
health by September, his potency remained in
question. Large doses of steroids administered
early in his illness probably kept him alive but
also might have affected his semen. Following a
two-month waiting period, Peptoboonsmal bred
four mares in November and three came in foal.
"Dr. Baker saved his life - there's no doubt
about it," Elaine said. "That November, I
started booking mares and we've been going
full-fledged ever since."
Those babies are to be the 2002 Futurity class.
Crops to come
Marketing pink looks like a lot of fun. At the
Futurity last December, there was no mistaking
which horse Elaine prefers. Sporting hot pink
ostrich boots, each emblazoned with navy blue "Petoboonsmal"
across the front," Elaine made her promotional
rounds and manned her booth. She carried a
matching pink ostrich handbag and kept warm with
a bright pink fur jacket. Probably the happiest
person in the place, Elaine pulled the outfit
off like no one else could - a class act down to
the toes of her pink boots.
"When it comes to getting dressed to go the
Futurity, by George, hot pink is it!" she said
happily.
The popularity of her stallion is sure to keep
her smiling. His stud fee started at $3,000 in
1996, went to $5,000 in 1999 and for the 2002
breeding season, is at $9,000, plus a $600 farm
service charge.
"I knew after the Futurity last year that if I
didn't raise the stud fee that I would look like
a woman in this business who didn't know what
she was doing," Elaine explained. "He's every
bit worth of nine or more."
With per horse average earnings reaching the
tens of thousands range, it doesn't take long to
calculate the cost/benefit ratio of a
Peptoboonsmal breeding. In the week after the
Futurity, Elaine literally couldn't leave her
constantly ringing phone. The 2002 book long
since closed and the 2003 mailing list is pages
long. Elaine remains steadfast about keeping the
per-year mare count to one hundred.
"It's real hard for me to say no," Elaine said
about mare owners wanting special consideration.
"It is wonderful to own a stud like Pepto that
is in demand and I am very grateful but I'm not
in this to get wealthy. My goal is to enjoy and
know my customers and make friends."
It's hard, however, to slow the runaway train of
her stallion's popularity, at least as long as
his offspring keep winning. Perhaps somewhere
down deep in Elaine's soul, she felt a little of
the rosy future when she came up with a
one-of-a-kind name for a one-of-a-king red roan
stud colt.
"I'll tell you one thing about the name
Peptoboonsmal," she said, "people are either
going to hate it or love it, but they're not
going to forget it."
No they won't.
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