Life is sweet for TF Choice Sugar

Valley News – Jan 21, 2014
In America, as in many parts of the world, the giant horse industries have competitions of various types all through the year. At year’s end are the finals in which only the best riders are invited to compete. In November, Tina Robinson qualified for the American Quarter Horse World Finals. This was the 40th anniversary of this renowned show and she and TF Choice Sugar spent two weeks in Oklahoma City having the time of their lives. Tina rides and trains horses for Mike and Sandy Focht’s Traveler’s Farm and last year she discovered that she had a very hot candidate in this Quarter Horse gelding.

We recently sat down with Robinson to get all the glorious details. She has a sweet face and a marshmallow voice and a lot of “horse sense.” She credits Sandy Collier with getting her started on the right track with her horse training. Now Tina and her husband Tucker Robinson have a barn full of their client’s horses.

“When we arrived in Oklahoma City the November weather was pretty nice,” Robinson said, “but the second week it started getting very cold and we were lucky to have finished just before a big ice storm blew in. The first day on the road, we drove a thousand miles, trying to stay ahead of the storm. But the people who were still competing were caught and some had to stay over for a while until the weather cleared up.”

TF Choice Sugar is a beautiful bay-roan, 4-year-old gelding that loves to work for her. His sire is SR Instant Choice and his dam is the Focht’s mare Peptos Sugar. In order to show in the finals, a rider must have a certain number of points to qualify, and Tina was competing against 54 of America’s top horses and riders.

“We started to realize this horse’s true potential in 2012 at the Snaffle Bit Futurity in Reno,” she said. “We won the Ladies Division and also ended up 16th in the Open division. He’s the third horse from Travelers Farm that I have done very well with.”

But it is the recent big American Quarter Horse World Show in Oklahoma that is so important now. Robinson and TF Choice Sugar won the Intermediate show and then placed third in the Open Division.

“I really didn’t think that showing there would be such a big deal,” she said, “but it was really an eye opener. I really think anyone interested should go there because you see all these amazing horses that compete in different classes including trail, western pleasure, etc. I did know a lot of the people there because I had competed against them during the year. There were 20 horses from California and 15 were finalists. I don’t pay a lot of attention to each score as my class is taking place. I concentrate on preparing my horse and what I need to do as a rider. I just do my best because you know that you could get beaten by just one half a point.”

Sandy Focht added, “I just have to brag a little bit because Tina scored 2241⁄2 down the fence, which is just incredible! We are so proud of her and TF Choice Sugar.

“At this show there are two parts,” Robinson said. “The fence work with a cow where you are showing your control over the cow. Then there is the reining pattern.

“I think the fence work is kind of like barrel racing with a moving barrel,” she added with a laugh. “After the preliminaries, we wait outside of the arena for the announcement of the scores and just the top 15 will go back in to compete for the finals.” (Then comes the heart-pounding moment.) “We enter the ring again

and line up and they start announcing the scores. All of a sudden I realized that we were in the top five, then the top three! It was awesome.

“I was thrilled to place third. The cow horse people are great folks, they cheer each other on because we all know how hard it is. You can go from being a hero to zero in no time flat.”