PrintFour things were against Mixed Up this year: his age, his lack of enthusiasm for soft ground, long distances and heavy weights.
Still, he pulled out the impossible, and at 10 years old, he garnered the titles that had eluded him for his entire career—the National Steeplechase Association Horse of The Year and the Eclipse Award for steeplechasing, which he won by a landslide.
Just a little horse, he’s best described as a sports car, fast and accurate on the turns and with extra gears when you need them. Like a sports car, however, he’s hampered by mud, cannot pull a trailer full of added weight and runs out of fuel faster than a mid-size sedan.
Over the years he’s won some prestigious races: the $150,000 New York Turf Writers (2006), the $100,000 Royal Chase (2007), the $80,000 A.P. Smithwick (2007). He even got a few Eclipse Award votes in 2006, but every time he won something big, he would get socked with weight for the next race and end up against the likes of Eclipse titans, McDynamo, Hirapour and, lately, Good Night Shirt.
“When you look who he lost to in those races you can see these were all very legitimate horses in big races,” trainer Jonathan Sheppard said. “It was hard to know where to put him. We tried to do something different.”
Sheppard added, “I think it’s fitting that in his supposed twilight years he’s running the best he ever has and is now a champion. He certainly has been knocking at the door for a number of years.”
But in 2009, Sheppard got cagey. First, he realized the Lasix (furosemide) Mixed Up had been on to prevent bleeding was actually doing more harm than good, and he took him off the drug, a bold move to be sure. The drug is widely used on the flat track and by jump trainers in the United States.
Then Sheppard chose small stakes features with short distances to start Mixed Up in the spring. Although once other trainers saw they had a grade I horse to contend with instead of the usual local suspects, the fields were not as strong. In May, Sheppard entered Mixed Up in a $50,000 race at Iroquois, but deep going at the Tennessee race sucked the life out of him, and he placed third.
As the summer season warmed up, Sheppard entered Mixed Up in one of the more competitive races, the $50,000 Zeke Ferguson at Colonial Downs (Va.), where he ran his heart out for second to the runaway leader Slip Away (Chip Miller).
Sheppard then took him back to Saratoga Springs (N.Y.), and he won the $100,000 A.P. Smithwick but failed to come back to win a few weeks later in the $100,000 Turf Writers Cup and again in the $150,000 Lonesome Glory at Belmont Park (N.Y).
The naysayers thought he was finished. Especially when Sheppard scratched him from the biggest race of the year, the $250,000 Grand National at Far Hills (N.J.).
“People are pretty quick to write Mixed Up off just for a couple of spotty races,” Sheppard said. “Look at his weights, who he was up against. There sure has been some tough company of late.”
Jockey and assistant trainer Danielle Hodsdon has sat in the irons for most of Mixed Up’s career wins. She’s always liked the little firecracker that she calls Mickey.
“I’ve been riding Mickey since he was 5,” Hodsdon said. “He was one of the first horses I raced when I started at Jonathan’s that year. He’s matured a lot, not really grown up, he’s still full of personality and a very naughty boy.
