Shine By The Bay came out on top of the open western-horse heap and earned the reserve Superhorse title from the 2003 American Quarter Horse Association World Championship Show. The reserve title was accompanied by a $2,500 paycheck.

 

Shine By The Bay earned the reserve Superhorse title from the 2003 American Quarter Horse Association World Championship Show. Shine By The Bay, a 1998 bay stallion by Shining Spark and out of Metermaid To Order, is owned by Rhodes River Ranch in Arlington, Wash. He won junior working cow horse with a 443-point composite score (217 points in the reined work and 226 points in the cow work), placed sixth in junior heading (216.5 points), 10th in junior reining (213 points) and 11th in junior heeling (214.5 points). He also qualified for junior calf roping, but didn’t make the finals.

Top hand Bob Avila, of Temecula, Calif., piloted Shine By The Bay in working cow horse and reining, and super-looper Robbie Schroeder, of Gainesville, Texas, rode in the roping events.

Splitting training time between California and Texas wasn’t a problem for Shine By The Bay or his pair of trainers. According to Avila, he and Schroeder planned to show the horse together when their shared client Eric Storey sold the horse to Rhodes River Ranch.

“Robbie and I work great together, so there weren’t any problems,” Avila said. “Robbie helps me, and I help him, so we make a good team. And the horse adapts very well.

“Our main goal this year was to make Shine By The Bay a world champion,” Avila continued. “Being in contention for Superhorse was just a side bonus.”

The world championship and high marks Shine By The Bay earned at the World Show extend the long list of successes he’s had. In 2002, Avila and the horse won the National Reined Cow Horse Stallion Stakes. Schroeder showed Shine By The Bay to the reserve limited open title at the 2001 NRCHA Snaffle Bit Futurity and placed fifth in the open division of the National Reining Horse Association Futurity that same year.

In the future, Shine By The Bay is pointed toward Avila’s breeding facility in California, and the trainer looks forward to garnering more prestigious titles aboard the horse.

Avila commended Shine By The Bay for his unquestionable talent.

“He’s just a freak of nature in terms of the great things he can do.”

Adding to Avila’s World Show success was his win in senior working cow horse with Brother White, a 1996 chestnut gelding by Smart Little Lena and out of White On Right. The pair marked a 217 in the reined work and a 223.5 down the fence. It’s the third time the trainer has won both junior and senior divisions of the class in one show.

“I never get too confident going into the working cow horse because of the role cattle play,” Avila commented. “This year both divisions had greater working cow horses than ever before. There were six or seven horses that could’ve won in each class.”

 

Write A Comment