Bugni Back To Back Ft. Smith Futurity Champion
May 27th, 2014
(Photo Credit Buddy Berry)
Mark Bugni had a banner year in 2013 and it doesn’t look to be stopping in 2014. One of his biggest accomplishments last year was winning Fort Smith and he can add another Old Fort Days Futurity win to his growing resume for 2014 and a check for $54,337.82 to his bank account.
Bugni won another big check upon Red Carpet Zoom “Zoomer”, a 4 year old AQHA brown gelding, sired by Azoom and out of VIP Treatment by First Down Dash, owned by Mike and Jan Dahlen from Iowa City, Iowa. The Dahlen’s purchased the gelding thru the Lance Graves Pro Classic Sale last February as a prospect from the Flying W Ranch in Texas. David Witcher broke the gelding while Shannon Witcher lightly started him on the barrels. Once the gelding was sold to the Dahlen’s, they sent him straight home with Bugni to begin his barrel racing career.
“He’s a very personable horse. He has the most personality that I have ever had in my barn. He is such a character and even on his bad days, he is still enjoyable. He would rather spend time with us at a barrel race then standing out in the pasture,” explained Bugni. This year at Fort Smith, there were 425 entries in the futurity with only 40 back to the short round. Bugni and Zoomer qualified for the short round with a 17.091, in the 31st position.
“We qualified in the same spot as we did last year so it felt like a great omen.”
Bugni and Zoomer had a good run in the progressive round, but jerked a shoe which cost them some serious time.
“He ran pretty fresh in the first round and sort of ran thru his turns. He then ended up jerking a shoe which really cost us some time,” explained Bugni.
Since they had a couple days before the short round, Bugni and Zoomer had some time to get a few issues ironed out.
“I immediately got his shoe tacked back on and then I worked on getting more rate into him before the short round. I ended up doing a bit change and went with an old Sharon Camarillo combination bit. He felt great in it during a practice run so I went ahead and used it during the short round.”
The bit change and added rate seemed to help, as Bugni and the brown gelding blazed a 16.475 to have the fastest futurity run of the weekend.
“He worked like a champ. He was much more focused and ran hard and turned hard. I knew he was hooking it strong coming home, but I didn’t hear my time until the announcer announced it a second time. My adrenaline was sky high and with the roar from the crowd, I couldn’t hear it the first time.”
Bugni says the win is extra sweet since he has won it two years in a row now and will try for a third time next year. This summer, Bugni will take Zoomer to some open races and will also try and get him qualified for the AQHA World Show next fall, and then will head north to the fall futurities.
Bugni would also like to thank all the owners of his horses and his sponsors, Animal Element, Horseswim.com, 5 Star Saddle Pads, Double J Saddlery, Loomis Bit and HorsePowerEQ.
Red Carpet Zoom is a Heritage Place 2011 Quarter Horse Yearling Sale Graduate!