How one tiny horse at Turf Paradise came to lead all of North America in victories

It’s unusual for someone to call his own idea degenerate. But Rob Rosette figured the best way to get his trainer, Robertino Diodoro, to sign off on the whimsical idea of spending $3,500 to claim a diminutive 4-year-old gelding running at Turf Paradise was to admit upfront that it didn’t make much sense.

“Hey, I want to do something really degenerate, if you don’t mind,” Rosette told Diodoro almost a year ago.

Diodoro burst out laughing.

“What are you going to do? Tell me,” Diodoro said.

“There is this horse,” Rosette began.

A lot of horse-racing dreams begin, and end, with the above sentence.

But Rosette’s dream came true. Make that present tense: is coming true.

Rosette claimed the horse, Shinny, for $3,500. All Shinny did in return was win 12 races in 2021, more than any other horse in North America, and about $140,000.

Not bad for a “degenerate” idea and an initial $3,500 investment.

Wednesday, Shinny raced for the first time this year, trying to win his 11th consecutive race. He didn’t. He gave a game effort but finished second, a length behind Rideo.

Rosette was still smiling at race end.

“I’m tickled pink,” he said. “He (Shinny) is going to get some carrots. Organic.”

Then  Rosette turned to the small group of friends who watched with him. “I got carne asada and beer at the stable.”

Wednesday afternoon’s race was Rosette’s second visit to Turf Paradise that day. His first was in the morning, when the only things stirring at Turf Paradise were owners, trainers, exercise riders and horses.

“Look at him, how tiny he is,” Rosette said then, pointing to Shinny. “He cracks me up, man.”

Two stalls down from Shinny was Tiger Dad, which Rosette claimed for $50,000 last summer in Del Mar, Calif. In his first start for Rosette, Tiger Dad won a $60,000 stakes race at Turf Paradise.

He’s the biggest horse in the barn, but not the most important. If not for the little horse two doors down, Rosette would not have claimed Tiger Dad, or bought a 2-year-old filly now training at Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs, Ark. He paid for them with house money won by Shinny.

Those horses dwarf Shinny in size, but not in accomplishments and not in the hearts of those who are around Shinny every day.

“That’s the horse I look forward to riding every day,” said Isaiah Ortiz, an assistant trainer and exercise rider. “He’s just a joy to be on. He does everything you ask him to. Everyone knows who he is. I’ll be riding by people and they’re like, ‘that’s Shinny.’ Yep, that’s Shinny.”

Outside tracks and winners circles, Shinny looks more like a horse that should be leading others to the starting gate. He can hide behind most other thoroughbreds, which he occasionally does on the outside of back stretches and the inside of home stretches.

But Shinny usually makes his presence known, often with a late kick that is something of a trademark.

Shinny has been a success since the day Rosette claimed him. He won that day at Turf Paradise, nine wide, which means he didn’t exactly take the fastest route around the track.

It was one race, but Rosette had an inkling he might have purchased a pretty special horse for only $3,500.

Rosette’s been around horses since he was a kid growing up in Holbrook. As a law student at Arizona State, he spent many an afternoon at Turf Paradise, when time permitted. Horses got into his blood, and racing was a way to stay competitive at something outside courtrooms.

A few years after re-settling in Phoenix, Rosette bought his first horse in 2003. Eventually, he had six or seven in the stable, but the pandemic contributed as that number dwindling to one by January of 2021.

Then came Shinny.

Ortiz first met Shinny in Canterbury Park in Minnesota, where Shinny also raced in 2021, and the introduction was brusque.

“He tried to buck me off,” Ortiz said. “I wasn’t warned at all. The boss mentioned later, ‘hey, I forgot to tell you, you have to watch him a bit.’

“Yea, I found that out.”

Turns out, Shinny was just playing around. Ortiz thought nothing of it. A friendship was born.

“He’s a horse who loves his job, loves his attention,” Ortiz said. “He just knew everybody was watching.”

Shinny’s third consecutive victory came last June. That’s when Ortiz knew the horse was special.

“The hat trick is tough to do, and he kept doing it, just did it easier every time,” Ortiz said. “Back and forth, from dirt to turf. Long, short, it didn’t matter for him.”

Shinny has met every challenge, including incremental steps up in class. For trainers and owners, there’s an art and a science to finding races that test a horse, yet don’t overwhelm him. Rosette and Diodoro successfully walked that line in 2021. Or, maybe, Shinny was just going too good, no matter who he raced.

For most of 2021, Shinny raced every three to five weeks, or so. That’s the plan for 2022, too, but Rosette said Shinny will ultimately decide that.

If Shinny shows sign of fatigue or injury, they will back off or shut him down. For another year, Shinny can run in starter optional races, which features a hybrid field comprised of some horses that can be claimed and others, like Shinny, that cannot.

After that, Rosette and Diodoro will figure out a long-term plan for Shinny, who will be a 6-year-old then.

Rosette doesn’t like to think too far ahead, but he would like to keep Shinny in the family long after his racing days are over.

“It’s always fun,” Rosette said of horse racing. “But the enjoyment he’s brought with victory after victory, I have a smile ear-to-ear thinking about Shinny. The least I could do is make sure he’s got to a smile ear-to-ear wherever he ends up, right?”

The very least, since it’s not often a degenerate idea becomes a dream fulfilled.

Reach Kent Somers at Kent.Somers@gannett.com. Follow him on twitter @kentsomers. Hear Somers every Monday and Friday at 7:30 a.m. on The Drive with Jody Oehler on Fox Sports 910 AM.

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