Bonfire Night - life as a racehorse

the start

After many twists and turns Bonfire Night has luckily grown into a good-looking 2-year-old (see above; photo taken at Oldendorf Stud, 18/05/08). In order to keep Bonfire Night in training we have recruited some of the the family and some good friends and formed a little syndicate; Bonfire will run in the colours of "Stall Power Flame", just as his mum Belle Fee did. Bonfire has joined Christian Sprengels yard in Hannover on saturday, june 1st, and now has to settle into the daily routine to become a proper racehorse. He misses his friends and feels a bit lonely at the moment, but the staff are happy with him and like him a lot. A small paddock injury means some quiet days in the horsewalker anyway, before work with the saddle will start again. Its early days to speculate about whether he will be able to run this season (as is always the case with 2 yr-olds),so we will let Bonfire do the talking on that matter.
Unfortunatly there are no photos from his first day in the yard as our car broke down on the way to Hannover!! :(

june 2008

Bonfire joined Christian Sprengel on the 1st of june and needed some time to settle into the new routine. He is doing fine now, goes into the horse-walker and is slowly getting used to being saddled and ridden. He is still growing as you can see from the newest photo.

september 2008

Bonfire is four month in training now and really starts to show signs of good improvement. He lost most of his puppy-fat and is quite lean now, in fact Christian "does not want him any lighter". Bonfire has a lovely temperament and is a quick learner, and the whole staff likes him a lot and is keen to ride him work. He has made huge strides in his daily routine, Christian was even quoted in saying that "he hardly ever had a horse who made such rapid improvement in such short period of time". Bonfire is keen and willing and does show talent at home, and looking at his photos I feel he does start to resemble Bukett, his head certainly looks like hers now. Christian mentioned the possibility of one run this season, but would have to "turn a few screws" , something he is rather reluctant to do after all Bonfire has been through so far. As Bonfire is offering so much now, we will continue to let him do the talking; he certainly will point us the right way.