Odds On Racing - Harness Racing

Buck I St. Pat in rein to John Campbell at Mohawk in 2007

An Irish Blessing never hurt anyone, especially a trotting filly.

Dr Ron Fuller of Newark, Ohio considers his filly Buck I St Pat more than a typical Irish Blessing. He considers her a product of good bloodlines and a methodical approach to training youngsters he’s dubbed "imprinting."

"About ten or 12 years I had a client who had a horse who flipped over when he was first introducing him to the breaking process," Fuller said. "We had to put the horse down, and I decided then and there that we had to find a better way to break horses."

Fuller cites the book "The Revolution of Horsemanship & Its Effect on Mankind," by Dr Robert Miller as the basis for his developing imprinting.

"Imprinting is nothing more than training and teaching at an early age," Fuller noted. "Thought his book, Miller got me started that year on imprinting on all our foals. We did this by clipping the ears, picking up the feet, line driving them, etc., all before they were weaned."

The filly by Jailhouse Jesse 4, 1:53.3 ($256,350) was born on St Patrick’s Day, (April 23) 2003. Fuller, her breeder, owns her dam, the Speed In Action mare Name It Something—a two and three-year-old season’s champion on the Southeastern Ohio Racing Circuit and winner of $26,302.

"I was really impressed Jesse’s credentials," Fuller noted. "He went in Finland in 2005, bred 22 mares and got 20 in foal. He’s coming back to Ohio for the 2006 season, and has eight yearlings in Ohio right now. With the limited numbers he’s had, he’s done outstandingly. I really wanted to have a foal from him, and Buck I St Pat is the result of that first mating."

A successful partnership indeed as Buck I St Pat won six of eight starts at 2, earning $77,436 in the process.

While Buck I St Pat was following her mother around the rolling hills of Fuller’s 100 acre family farm in Morgan County in the summer of 2003, the veterinarian was already hooking her to a cart.
Buck I St. Pat at Colonial

"I hooked this filly as a baby," Fuller said. "I had a small harness and a little cart and she followed her mother everywhere wearing it. I’d take this baby with the harness and cart going to the field and coming back. I did this with her once a month in the beginning and then every two weeks, and then once a week and then a couple of times a week."

Fuller, now in his seventh decade, was born and raised in the horse business in McConnelsville, Ohio. His father was H.M. Fuller, the trainer behind the legendary Fulla Napoleon. For over 40 years Ron has plied his trade as a small animal and equine veterinarian at his Newark Animal Hospital outside of Columbus, Ohio. A 1958 graduate of The Ohio State University, Fuller still continues an equine practice in his self-proclaimed "semi-retirement."

"As a kid I showed horses and road ponies," Fuller recalled. "When I went to college I sold one of my roping horses in order to buy a microscope that I needed for class. I did not have a horse for the first time in my life and when I graduated from Ohio State my father gave me half-interest in a pacer, and I started driving Standardbreds."

Fuller has never quit driving and he’s never been able to rid himself of his love and fascination with his equine friends.

"The first race I drove was at Scioto Downs was when the track first opened," Fuller said. "It was a short meet, only a month or six weeks. I didn’t have silks at the time so I used someone else’s silks to race. I raced in the mud, driving a horse named Twin City Adios, and I ended up winning by a nose in a photo finish. I remember it so well because I had to give the silks back to the guy I borrowed them from because he was in the next race."

"That’s how I got started and it led me to this; it led me to this filly after 48 years," Fuller said. "It took me that long to get success in this business. But I have no doubt that the imprinting made a world of difference with her and her personality. The imprinted foals are just that way—they want to please you and they want to be with you, or whomever they’ve bonded with. They learn forever and what they learn in those early days when they’re still with their dams is invaluable throughout their career.

"It’s a lot easier to work with one at 150 pounds than at 1,200 pounds," Fuller added.

Buck I St Pat’s first official outing came in an Ohio Fair Stakes contest at Circleville on June 19, 2005 for driver Bob Harper. She made no bones about her intent, winning by nearly three lengths in 2:07.2. The following week she made her pair-mutuel debut at Northfield Park, this time winning in 2:03.4 in a $20,000 Ohio Sire Stakes event by 3 ½ lengths for her connections. It was to be the first of six straight victories for Buck I St Pat.

"We taught her to race from behind and that’s what she did. She went out and raced from behind," Fuller said.

After her win at Northfield, Buck I St Pat returned to her home base of Scioto Downs, this time winning another $20,000 OSS event in 2:01.3 by nearly eight lengths on July 3. She followed that up with another victory in the same class ($20,000 OSS) on July 16, winning in 2:01.4 by five lengths.

Three weeks later she returned to Sire Stakes action, winning in 2:004 by four lengths at Raceway Park and bringing home another $10,000. On August 27 she took her lifetime best mark of 1:58.4 at Scioto Downs, winning the $20,000 OSS by nearly nine lengths.

She suffered her first defeat after a brutal trip when she was parked from the half to the wire on September 3 at Northfield, this time in the $100,000 OSS Final. However, even in defeat Buck I St Pat was not easily out-shown, as she only relented to rival Jailhouse Denise by a quarter of length in a mile timed in 1:59 from post eight.

Buck I St Pat’s only miscue came in her last race of the season, when she went postward over the famed Delaware County Fairgrounds in a $25,551 Ohio Breeders Championship with a new driver in the sulky for the first time in late September. She made a very uncharacteristic break at the 1:01.2 half and was beaten 17 lengths.

"That was an odd day and the filly really wasn’t herself that day, nor was she used to the new person in the sulky," Fuller recalled.

Throughout her races, however, one point about Buck I St Pat has stood out—her calm and cool demeanor both on and off the racetrack.

"The only known legal stimulant is our own adreneline, the horse’s adreniline," Fuller said. "If horses are relaxed, they won’t use their adreniline up before the race. That doesn’t mean they’re going through their life undefeated. It just means that the more adreniline that’s left on the end of the exercise the better they’re going to do."

"A lot of people have this misconception that you can’t do this or that with a horse because it will ‘break their spirit,’" Fuller said. "That’s just nonsense. Will imprinting make every horse fast? No, of course it won’t, but it will make the horse an all-around better individual to work with."

Buck I St. Pat's Career Statistics Through July 1, 2008
Year  Sts/1sts/2nds/3rds Earnings     Record       Venue & Record Date
2008      13      9    2   1        $359,224      5, 1:52.2F      Chst 05/25/2008
2007      14      5    3    1       $328,500      4, 1:52.4M      M 05/05/2007
2006      20     10   2    1       $183,367      3, 1:54.2F      DD 11/05/2006
2005       8      6    1    0       $77,436        2, 1:58.4F      ScD 08/27/2005
Total     55    30   8   3       $948,527     5, 1:52.2F