Remembering a champion – Sunshine Forever

Sunshine Forever, the first Thoroughbred stallion returned to the United States from Japan by Michael Blowen, owner and founder of Old Friends, a Thoroughbred retirement farm in Georgetown and Midway, passed away in his paddock in the early morning hours of Tuesday, Jan. 6, 2014. He was 29 years old.

"Our foundation stallion, the Eclipse Award winner who we brought home after his breeding career was over, is dead. I don't think I've ever been sadder," said Blowen.

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Sometimes a short obituary like the one above in a newspaper or magazine doesn't tell the whole story of a Thoroughbred's life. Sometimes a Thoroughbred's life deserves more so that people can understand the importance of that horse's life.

Sunshine Forever, the Thoroughbred champion who was brought home from Japan and lived at Old Friends in Georgetown, is one of those that deserve more than just a short obituary. Not just because he was a champion Thoroughbred, but because of what he meant to all of those who met him.

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Sunshine Forever's life at Old Friends began in November 2004. Thanks to Blowen, Sunshine, along with another Old Friends’ retiree, Creator, arrived at an airport in New York after a long flight from Japan.

A few days later, Sunshine and Creator moved into Hurstland Farm in Midway, where Old Friends was located at the time. The two Thoroughbreds became the first two stallions Blowen brought home to the United States from Japan following the death, by slaughter, of 1986 Kentucky Derby winner, Ferdinand.

At the time of his arrival home, Sunshine, who had been a favorite of Blowen's because of his racing accomplishments, was not in the best of shape. However, with each passing day, he became fitter and stronger. Soon Sunshine adapted well to his new life of retirement and became the foundation stallion of what would become one of the best known Thoroughbred retirement farms in the United States.

A few year's after Sunshine's arrival at Old Friends, Blowen would move to Dream Chase Farm in Georgetown, the facility's new permanent home. There, Sunshine was placed in the paddock out in front of the farm's main house. In that way, every morning when he woke up and every night before he went to sleep, Blowen could see his favorite horse just outside his window.

"I could look out the window and I could see him," said Blowen of why he placed Sunshine in that front paddock. In addition, "I always had carrots in the garage, so I could grab a handful of carrots and then in 30 seconds I could be with him. … I just wanted to be able to get easy access. And, it was great."

While other horses on the farm were moved around at times, that paddock would be Sunshine's home the entire time he lived at Old Friends.

It's an early morning at Old Friends. The sun is just starting to rise and Blowen is making his morning feeding rounds of the farm on an old, beat up, two-seat golf cart.

At each paddock, a horse walks or trots up to the fence to greet him. Blowen stops, puts some carrots in a pre-loaded feed bucket and feeds each horse. He smiles, talks a little to the horse, pats him on the neck, then gets back into the cart and drives on down the lane to the next paddock.

As the golf cart nears Sunshine's paddock, Blowen's face brightens as he watches the beautiful, bay stallion trot across his paddock to the fence to greet him and wait for his morning feed.

To Blowen, all of the horses on the farm are special. But, there is no question that Sunshine is his favorite. His eyes get an extra sparkle and the smile on his face broadens measurably whenever he sees Sunshine. Blowen’s voice even rises just a little in the delight and respect he feels when he talks about him.

"He was my favorite horse," said Blowen. "He was the first horse we ever brought home from Japan after his breeding career was over, so he set the standard. He wasn't the friendliest horse, he wasn't a big pet or anything, but I had such a great deal of respect for him."

Blowen gets out of the cart, grabs a handful of carrots, walks over to the fence and gives a couple to Sunshine, who happily scoops them up and munches away.

Then Blowen looks at Sunshine and asks, "Are you the greatest horse on the farm."

Without missing a beat, Sunshine nods his head up and down as if to say, "Yes!"

Blowen laughs and gives Sunshine a couple more carrots.

It's a trick he and Sunshine have been performing for visitors for years. But, sometimes, Blowen likes to do it when the two are alone and just sharing a quiet moment together.

"The first time that happened was when Richard Schlesinger came here with the CBS Evening News (to do a story about Old Friends) and we were just goofing around," said Blowen. "(Then) Schlesinger said, 'What do you do?'

"I said, 'Oh, … I don't do anything. I just feed them carrots and talk to them.'

"And, Schlesinger goes, 'Well, what are you going to say to him?'

"I said, 'I don't know. I'll ask him a question. I said, 'Are you the greatest horse on this farm?' And (Sunshine) nodded. So, then I gave him a carrot.

"Well, Sunshine's smart. So, now, every time he does it, he gets a carrot."

Sunshine Forever, who is by Roberto-Outward Sunshine, by Graustark, was owned and bred by John Galbreath's Darby Dan Farm, trained by John Veitch, and ridden in 17 of 23 of his races by hall of fame jockey Angel Cordero.

During his racing career, Sunshine won eight races, finished second six times, third two times and had $2,084,800 in earnings.

Five of those wins, all on turf, came as a 3-year old in 1988 and were stakes races. Three of them were Grade 1s – the Man O'War Stakes (G1), the Turf Classic Stakes (G1), and the Budweiser International Stakes (G1) at Laurel Race Track on Oct. 23.

All of those wins helped earn him the 1988 Eclipse Award as Champion Turf Horse.

Sunshine raced again as a 4-year-old, but did not have the same success as the previous year, so he was retired to stud, first at Darby Dan from 1990 to 1995, and then to Hayata Farm in Japan from 1996 to 2004.

As his stud career began to wind down, Blowen made contact with the Japanese farm where Sunshine was located, as well as the Japanese Racing Association, and after a lot of very hard work, and with the help of a lot of people – including a loan from his mother-in-law – Blowen was finally able to bring Sunshine home to the United States.

Originally, Sunshine and Criminal Type were the two horses that were going to come home to the United States, but just before the two were to make the trip, Criminal Type died. So, Creator was selected to join Sunshine on the journey.

The return of Sunshine Forever also opened the door for other Thoroughbreds to be returned to the United States from Japan, including Ogygian and Wallenda, who still live at Old Friends, and Fraise, who passed away at the farm in 2005.

On a sunny afternoon, Old Friends' volunteer, Teri Haverfield, is giving one of the daily tours of the farm. When the tour group reaches Sunshine Forever's paddock, Haverfield gives the stallion a few carrots and talks about the life and history of the former champion. Then, she answers visitor's questions about the horse.

After that, she would normally move on to the next paddock. But, at Sunshine's paddock, there is one more thing Haverfield likes to do and that is to get everyone to sing “You are My Sunshine" to Sunshine Forever.

Each time, she would begin the song, the visitors would laugh and then happily join in. Meanwhile, Sunshine would just stand there and nod his head in approval.

"Teri would not let (the visitors) off the tour until they all (sang) a chorus of "You are My Sunshine" to Sunshine Forever," said Blowen with a chuckle. "So when she would come and do the tour, she would lead this chorus, and I would always know it was Teri out there when I could hear everybody singing "You are My Sunshine," while he nodded his head."

Haverfield came up with the idea of singing the song one day when giving a tour of the farm to a very special group of people.

"I had a tour of adults with brain injuries," said Haverfield. "It was just an amazing experience. I was wondering how we could make it even better. We arrived at Sunshine's paddock. He seemed to sense more than any other horse just how ‘special’ these visitors were. He shook his head vigorously when asked if he was the greatest horse in the world. He stood extra still for the visitors to touch him. He just did everything perfectly. He calmed even the most frightened visitor. Everyone was grinning.

"Then it just came to me. Let's sing "You are My Sunshine." On the count of three, we all sang at the top of our lungs – rather off key on my part. If I recall correctly, there was not one dry eye in the group. It was simply perfection. But that was Sunshine – always simply perfect."

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One of the reasons Blowen loved and respected Sunshine Forever so much was because of a string of Grade 1 races he ran in late 1988, which helped earn the Thoroughbred his Eclipse award.

In an eight-week period, Sunshine raced in four separate Grade 1 turf races – unheard of today. What was even more impressive was that he won three of them and lost the fourth one by the slimmest of margins.

It was eight weeks of racing that Blowen still eagerly, and enthusiastically, recalls to this day.

The first of the four races, all of them with jockey Angel Cordero riding, was the 1-3/8-mile Man O'War Stakes (G1) at Belmont Park on Sept. 24. Sunshine won the race by a half-length over Pay the Butler.

Two weeks later on Oct. 8, Sunshine ran in the 1-1/2-mile Turf Classic Stakes (G1) at Belmont Park, and won by 4-3/4 lengths over My Big Boy.

Then, two weeks after that on Oct. 23, Sunshine ran in the 1-1/4-mile Budweiser International Stakes (G1) at Laurel Race Track. That race turned out to be, not only the best race of Sunshine's career, but one of the great races in Thoroughbred history.

In that race, Sunshine tracked the race leaders for most of the race. Then, at the far turn, he slipped between horses and took the lead as they entered the stretch.

Coming down the stretch, two other horses, a French horse named Squill started charging after Sunshine on the outside, while on the inside, Frankly Perfect, also began to gain ground.

Squill was the first to make a move on Sunshine at the sixteenth-pole. He ran past Sunshine on the outside and opened up almost a one-length lead. About the same time, Frankly Perfect passed Sunshine along the rail, but still behind Squill.

Now, usually when a horse gets passed in a race, especially if the horse is squeezed between the two horses passing him, that is pretty much the end of the race for that horse.

But, that was not the case with Sunshine in that race, and the result was one of those indescribable moments in horse racing that left spectators awestruck and speechless.

As all seemed lost for Sunshine, he dug down deep within himself, drew deep breaths of air into his large, barreled chest, and slowly began to work his way back between the two horses, passing Squill, and then desperately charging ahead to catch Frankly Perfect as the finish line approached.

At the wire, Sunshine won the race by just a neck and secured his place in racing history. Frankly Perfect finished second and Squill finished third.

Two week's later on Nov. 5 at Churchill Downs, the string of Sunshine's four consecutive Grade 1 races in eight weeks came to an end. After winning three of them in a row, Sunshine lost the final one by just a head to Great Communicator in the 1-1/2-mile Breeders' Cup Turf (G1).

In the end, however, that string of three Grade 1 wins, along with two other wins that year – the Lexington Stakes (G2) at Belmont on July 10, and the Hill Prince Stakes (G3) at Belmont on June 24 – earned the stallion the 1988 Eclipse Award as Turf Champion.

Those races, especially the win in the Budweiser International, also earned Sunshine Blowen's utmost respect. It was the reason that, when Blowen saw Sunshine's name listed in an article about horses in Japan that might be in jeopardy following the incident with Ferdinand, Blowen worked so hard to try and bring Sunshine home to the United States and to Old Friends.

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As season's passed and the year's melted away, Sunshine Forever lived out his life at Old Friends spending long, peaceful days grazing on the grass in his paddock, taking long naps, and enjoying carrots and treats from visitors when they came by on tours.

Between tours and after hours, the volunteers at Old Friends would walk around and visit with their favorite horses on the farm, and, eventually, end up at Sunshine's paddock because… well, he really was everyone's favorite horse on the farm. There they'd give him carrots and other treats, and some would ask him, "Who's the greatest horse on the farm?" Sunshine would nod, the volunteer would smile, and Sunshine would get a few more carrots.

Then, after the day's tours were over and the volunteers had all gone home, Blowen would go into his garage, get a bucket of carrots and go out to check on the horses before calling it a day.

Eventually, he'd end up at Sunshine's paddock and the two would spend some time together simply enjoying each other's company. It is those moments that Blowen enjoyed the most.

But, sadly, that all changed on Tuesday, Jan. 6, when Sunshine passed away.

"I have to say when I woke up that morning and I saw him down I knew he was dead," said Blowen. "I went out there, and I just couldn't believe it. I started to scream. It was like this scream that came from the marrow of my bones. I never made a sound like that in my life. I mean, it was just so agonizing. It was just awful."

It's a damp and rainy early Saturday morning, just four days after Sunshine Forever passed away. A cold wind blows across the empty paddock where he once ran around, possibly reliving past races in his mind, if that is possible for a horse to do.

There in the paddock, Sunshine’s hay feeder is still half full; the hay uneaten. His food bucket hangs empty on the fence where he used to wait for Blowen to bring his feed, and his waterer is still full, though he is no longer there to take a drink.

A few hours later, the rain stops and the sun breaks through the clouds. It's the start of a new day at Old Friends.

Sometime in the next week or so, a new Thoroughbred retiree will arrive at the farm, while daily tours will continue to be given, tales will to be told, and visitors will laugh and take photos of their favorite horses.

Soon, a new horse will even move into Sunshine's old paddock.

As it has always been, life goes on, and time will heal the sorrow of losing Sunshine Forever. Still, for Blowen, there will never be another horse that will fill his life, and his heart, like Sunshine did while he lived at Old Friends.

"You know, he was the horse that knew how much we struggled," said Blowen. "He just knew from the beginning. From the time that I dragged my mother-in-law to the bank to get the loan so he could come back from Japan (in) 2004; and it's almost 10 years that he was here. He kind of knew from the beginning what the story was, and I always felt that he understood that.

"… I always felt that he knew what was going on and how to handle it," continued Blowen. "He knew horses were going to come in and horses were going to leave. He was a real veteran. He was really, really smart, and he remembered all this. Whatever memories he had, he had memories of being with us since (the start) … a long time.

"We'll never have another horse on the farm, no matter how great the horse is, no matter how much I love all of them, we'll never have (another one like Sunshine). I might like them just as much, and I'll take care of them just as much, but he left a hole that can never be filled because of his experience and how long we had him."

Sunshine Forever was more than just a beautiful horse. He was a great Thoroughbred champion who was, not only a cherished friend and companion of Blowen’s, but a friendly horse that made everyone smile when they met him or gave him a carrot. He will be missed.

(This article first appeared in The Woodford Sun on Thursday, Jan. 16, 2014. It is reprinted here courtesy of the paper.)