HAZ ARD UZMATERIAL

Dave Mize looked at more than a hundred prospects before he stopped on a red roan colt by Metallic Cat out of Scooters Daisy Dukes. What caught him wasn't hype — it was the stop, and the way the colt used his front feet. Tres Osos Performance Horses, the program Linda Mars built with Paula and Dave Mize, bought him as a prospect to resell.

Then they got to know him. Around the barn he's "Skeeter" — a phenomenal stopper, a genuine herd horse, and the kind of mind Metallic Cat is famous for stamping. The sale never happened. Some horses you flip. This one became the heart of the whole program.

In Lipan, Texas, Erin Taormino took the reins — and together they rewrote NRCHA history. His early years weren't easy, and that's the point: he flourished when it counted, and he's never stopped.