Registration:  ApHC #207092
Foaled:  March 16, 1973
Died:     April 1984
Color:   Chestnut

We Go Easy's history is part of the Appaloosa racing dynasty tracing back to fellow Racing Hall of Fame mare Wego Melody. Hall of Fame breeder Gene Miles of Wichita, Kansas, based his program on crossing top Appaloosa mares with record-setting Thoroughbred and Quarter Horse stallions. He bred his mare and 1998 Racing Hall of Fame inductee We Go Charge to AQHA speedster Easy Jet. The cross produced Racing Hall of Fame inductees We Go Easy in March 1973 and her brother Easy We Go in 1977.

The bold chestnut filly raced for two seasons, receiving the 1975 two-year-old sprint filly and the 1976 three-year-old filly championships. Jockey Mike Ravelick described her in a 1976 interview with Appaloosa News as, "a real sweet horse that enjoys running." In her two-year racing career she earned over $81,627 in 22 starts with 19 wins, two places and one show.

We Go Easy set a world record for two furlongs -- :22 1/5 seconds -- and 10 individual track records at various sprinting distances. More than 20 years later, six of her records still stand.

In 1976, she broke speed barriers in racing when she was matched against Right Pocket -- a Thoroughbred gelding thought to be the fastest sprinter in the Midwest. Held at Detroit Race Course in Livona, Michigan, the $20,000 winner-take-all race was the state's richest ever. We Go Easy bobbled at the starting gate but won the quarter-mile race by an easy length and a half.

After the race, Gene announced We Go Easy's retirement from the track. As a broodmare, she produced five foals, including three race starters. In April 1984, at the age of 11, We Go Easy's production years were cut short when she died of colic.

{This article, by Michelle Berg, originally appeared in the Appaloosa Journal, July 1999, Vol. 53, No. 7, "Appaloosa Bloodlines We Go Easy," and is used here, with two minor corrections, by permission.}

Copyright © 1999 All rights reserved.