For the second straight year, the high seller at the Old West Rope Horse Sale and Futurity in Heber City, Utah, came from the Relentless Remuda in Relentless Empire, the 3-year-old mare by Show Me The Buckles out of their futurity standout Relentless Glory.

The mare topped the June 19, 2026 sale, selling for $900,000 to team roper Bryan Beaver. Trevor Brazile and Miles Baker’s Relentless Remuda owned and consigned the mare in partnership with Jerad Wittwer.

The result extends a run that rewrote the market a year ago. At the 2025 Old West sale, the Remuda and partners Solo Select sold Crosby Ray Von for $1.7 million—the highest price ever paid for a Western performance horse at public auction. Empire didn’t chase that single-horse record, but the depth behind her told its own story: the three Show Me The Buckles offspring the Relentless Remuda brought to Heber City sold for a collective $1.7 million—the same figure one mare commanded a year earlier, now spread across a single stallion’s get. Empire sells eligible for every major incentive in the rope horse industry, the kind of earning runway that keeps these consignments spoken for long before they reach the ring.

Relentless Empire: A Program Come Full Circle

For Baker, Empire’s sale closed a loop years in the making.

Both horses behind her trace to the beginning of what he and Brazile built. Baker bought his half of Show Me The Buckles on borrowed time—he didn’t have the money until the day after the deal, when a spur-of-the-moment head-horse sale covered it. Relentless Glory, Empire’s dam, was a mare Baker rode for Brazile back when he was in Oklahoma looking after cattle.

“Those two horses were a huge part of the beginnings of what Trevor and I were doing,” Baker said.

Empire was foaled and raised on their place in Decatur. Baker sent her to colt starter Tyson Benson as a 2-year-old, brought her home, and watched her become the kind of mare buyers chase.

“Seeing those things born on your place, going to where they are right now—it’s pretty dang cool for me,” Baker said. “These things look like they’re going to make it, and then they get where they are now, and they have made it, and then they do that at the sale. I know they’re going to go on to do a lot more.”

A Cross Built on Purpose

Empire carries that history on both sides of her pedigree.

Her sire, Show Me The Buckles, is the 2008 palomino reining stallion the program leaned on to stamp head and heel horses. A son of Wimpys Little Step, he earned $156,943, won the 2011 NRHA Open Futurity Co-Reserve Championship and now stands at the Lazy E Ranch in Guthrie, Oklahoma owned by Reliance Ranches. His get include RR Buckles Clubhouse, a $254,801 earner and ARHFA Old West Judged Open Heading Futurity Reserve Champion—proof the cross already wins in the heading pen at this exact sale.

Her dam, Relentless Glory, is one of the team roping futurity industry’s elite head horse mares—a Select Genes mare the Relentless Remuda owns in partnership with Solo Select. The Metallic Cat mare won the Royal Crown 6-&-Under Heading in Waco, Texas, with Brazile heading, and Brazile has called her “showy and forgiving”—the kind of mare he’d take to any show or jackpot.

The Buyer Who Put Them on the Map

Beaver’s history with the program runs back to before there was a Relentless Remuda.

The non-pro, who didn’t start roping until he was 50, bought the gelding he calls Captain—Smartys Dunny—at the top of the 2021 Rancho Rio sale for $250,000, a number that stood at the time as one of the most ever paid for a head horse. Brazile and Baker’s father owned the horse; Baker, just getting started, made nothing on the sale. But it put the partners on the map, and it started a friendship.

“Now Beave calls me on the phone and gives me life advice and tells me he loves me when we hang up,” Baker said. “He treats me like I’m a son to him. He’s ride-or-die Relentless Remuda.”

Beaver already owned two Show Me The Buckles horses—RR Buckles Clubhouse and Tuckin Away Buckles—before Empire. This time, Baker said, he came in knowing exactly what he wanted.

“He told us, ‘I’ve got all the horses I need to rope on. I want a good mare, I want to raise some babies,'” Baker said. “He knew that mare was special to us and a huge part of mine and Trevor’s program. That’s the one he wanted, and he picked a dang good one.”

Beaver tells the cross the same way.

“To have a Show Me The Buckles baby out of that mare, I was like, this is the one,” Beaver said. “I’ve got to own this horse.”

Six Clients, and a Green Light

Empire sold into a program built on scarcity, not volume. Brazile and Baker keep a short string and a shorter client list, and prospects are often claimed before they ever reach a sale.

“I counted on my hand the other day—I think we have six customers,” Baker said. “Six ride-or-die people. We’re not interested in having a bunch of clients. We want a few good ones.”

That’s by design. Baker said he and Brazile ride far fewer horses than most programs, and when one comes up, the phone does the work.

“I’ve got four or five clients right now sitting on a green light—’When you’ve got one, call me, I’m ready,'” Baker said. “Trevor and I don’t have to worry about keeping people out, because our clients won’t let people in.”

What’s Next for Empire

Like Clubhouse before her, Empire stays in the Relentless Remuda program. She goes back to Baker to keep developing toward her 4-year-old year, the season the futurity money is built for.

The hard part, Baker said, is already behind her. The mares are vetted hard before they sell, and not all of them make the cut.

“It’s my job, before I let my clients put their money up, to make sure they’re what we think they are,” Baker said. “I put a lot of heat on them leading up to this. Empire and Show Me Relentless and the Sunset mare made it. They don’t all make the cut.”

From here, the work eases into a longer build.

“Now I’ll keep roping on her, but it’s a longer process—not a pressure test,” Baker said. “Just putting runs on her and getting her solid, so once we start showing, the train’s already headed down the tracks the right way.”

For Baker, the high seller is a milestone, but not the point.

“I know I have a much higher purpose here than training horses and selling high sellers,” he said. “I want this industry to be good for everybody—the kind people can come into, get involved and enjoy.”