Shotgun Kowboy

When the dark bay colt dropped as a foal in 2012 on the farm of Oklahoma Horse Racing Hall of Fame owner-trainer-breeder C.R. Trout of Edmond, Okla., no one had any idea that Shotgun Kowboy would have the decorated career he would and wind up joining Trout in the hall.

Trout’s wife Arletta (who passed away in 2019) took it upon herself to name him from his breeding – by Kodiak Kowboy, out of the Siphon (BRZ) mare Shotgun Jane. Only a couple of years later the dark bay colt became a gelding and began gunning down his competition with ease.

In the first race of his career, Shotgun Kowboy mowed down a field of 11 juvenile maidens by 12-3/4 lengths to stamp the memory of his initial win as an imprint on anyone lucky enough to have been watching the birth of a champion.

Three feats in his illustrious career were exclamation points in his running lines for his six-year stint on the racetrack. Shotgun Kowboy ended a streak that started in 1990 where an Oklahoma-bred did not win the Oklahoma Derby. When he won the top race at Remington Park in 2015, Shotgun Kowboy halted that streak and joined the great Clever Trevor, who won the inaugural running of the race when it was the Remington Park Derby, as the only Okie-breds to win the race.

Then on Oct. 18, 2019, Shotgun Kowboy became the only horse in Remington Park history to win the Oklahoma Classics Cup four times, the richest race on Oklahoma Classics night. He also won the race in 2015, 2017 and 2018. Prior to that night, he was tied with millionaire Mr Ross and Remington Park superstar Zee Oh Six with three Cup victories.

The other cornerstone of his racing career was May 27, 2018, when he defeated Grade 1 winner Mubtaahij, from the barn of Horse Racing Hall of Fame trainer Bob Baffert. Shotgun Kowboy knocked off the Baffert star in the Grade 3 Lone Star Park Handicap in Grand Prairie, Texas. Shotgun Kowboy went wire to wire under jockey Luis Quinonez, outlasting Mubtaahij by 1-1/2 lengths. Mubtaahij would go on to win an amazing $5,780,332 in his career.

One of the amazing things about Shotgun Kowboy was that it didn’t seem to matter what jockey was in the saddle, he would prove to be the best. Three different riders booted him home a winner in his Classics Cups – two for David Cabrera and one apiece for Remington Park’s all-time winningest jockey Cliff Berry and Richard Eramia. Other jockeys with wins aboard the multiple stakes winner include Jareth Loveberry and Alex Birzer.

Shotgun Kowboy raced 40 times in his career, winning 15 races, running second five times and third another eight times. His record at Remington Park was 17 starts, 10 wins, two seconds and four thirds for $982,020 earned here. Had he run first or second in his final race – the Jeffrey Hawk Memorial at Remington Park, he would have been the only horse in track history to win $1 million or more over the Oklahoma City track. Instead he finished third, 6-3/4 lengths behind the second-place finisher.

Shotgun Kowboy finished his career in the No. 3 spot all-time among Oklahoma-bred earners behind two of the greatest on the national scene – turf superstar Kip Deville, who earned $3,325,489 in his career and national Horse of the Year in 1986, Lady’s Secret, who banked $3,021,325.