Clay Smith leads the NFR aggregate through six rounds on Hello Lashes, a 2013 mare owned by his 14-year-old sister-in-law Miley, in the mare’s first appearance on rodeo’s biggest stage.
By Docs Wild Seven and out of Little Traylene by Cinco Milagro, Hello Lashes is new to the Premier Rope Horses string, having come from the Relentless Remuda’s Treston Brazile earlier this fall. But the Braziles bought her from top cowgirl Tibba Smith.
“Trent Walls owned her, but I had her for a year and a half,” said Smith, an all-around hand from Hobbs, New Mexico. “Most of the time I breakaway roped off her at all the big rodeos. I made the semis at Houston and Cheyenne on her. And I rode her at the Ariat WSTR Finale last year, and I came back sixth high call in #13.5, and I had a steer duck is head and I missed him for $100,000.”
A few months later, Trevor Brazile spotted the mare at a jackpot at Kerry Kelley’s arena in Weatherford, Texas, and he pointed him out to his then 16-year-old son, Treston.
“My dad said Tibba Smith had the best horse there,” Treston said. “That ended up being Lashes. He’d seen her somewhere else when they were breakawaying or running barrels on her, and they had started heading on her not too long before.”
Treston bought the mare to jackpot on, but she came up sore right as he needed her for BFI Week this spring. So Treston tried out Shaq, one of his dad and Miles Bakers’ help horses, and he traded his dad’s horses so he’d have something to ride at the Lazy E. He jump-rode her at the Texas High School Finals Rodeo, though, when the steers tried too hard for his old horse, Wishbone.
Miley Richey had seen the horse go with the Relentless Remuda clan, and she bought the horse after Smith won the Old West Futurity this summer with Lead On, Richey’s other hard-running bay horse. Richey rode the horse at Charly Crawford’s American Hero Celebration in the Cowtown Coliseum heading for Junior Nogueira, and her brother Cason won the college rodeo at Texas Tech on her.
“The good thing about her is she can be level one or level 10,” Treston said. “She adjusts her user level to whoever is on her back, and that’s what’s amazing about her.”
When it came to a Las Vegas mount, Smith wanted something that would let him use his horse and take smart shots, and that’s what Lashes has done so far.
“She feels really easy, she’s running hard, and she’s easy to catch on,” Smith said. “I’m just trying to get them all caught.”
“Speed kills, and Clay’s been a prime example of that,” Treston added. “In any setup, even in the Thomas & Mack, speed is important, and she’s the fastest horse I’ve ever rode. Clay obviously is so handy with a rope, but he doesn’t have to use it as much because she’s doing the work, too. He’s not having to throw two or three coils in that small arena.”
Smith and Payne are 48.80 on six, the only team to have six times on the board. They haven’t won much in the day-moneys this week—just $20,866.84 a man so far—but with the average paying $86,391.31 a man, Smith and Payne want to stay hooked.
“It’s hard to throw away what we’re doing as far as just catching,” Smith said. “It makes it hard to try to mess up too much.”
An average win won’t be enough to put them in the race for the gold buckle at this point, but some go-round checks could put them back in the conversation over the next few rounds.
Meanwhile, Lashes has a baby coming this spring by Firewaterontherocks for the Relentless Remuda, and the Richeys’ Premier Rope Horses program will breed her to Bet Hesa Ginnin in spring 2025.
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