The next exhibitor in our highly popular “10 Things You Probably Don’t Know about Me” series is Kathy Tobin of Paradise Valley, Arizona. One of the kindest and most gracious people in our industry, this Select Amateur is a longtime client of Jim and Deanna Searles and is known by many as the owner of leading hunt seat sire, Allocate Your Assets.
Tobin is just off a great show at the Congress with a win in the Select Amateur Trail with Suddenly A Good Bar and two Reserve Championships in the Select Amateur Horsemanship with RA Undisputed and Select Amateur Western Riding with VS Game Changer. Her young horse, VS Game Changer, won the Junior Western Riding with Chris Holbin in the saddle and her mare, Hereicomeagain, won the 15-18 Youth Western Pleasure with Taylor Searles.
GoHorseShow congratulates her on having a great show, and we look forward to seeing all of her horses compete for gold at the AQHA World Show.
We’d like to thank Kathy for sharing some insightful things about herself with our readers.
10 Things You Probably Don’t Know about Kathy Tobin
1. I rode my first horse at five years-old and showed in my first official AQHA horse show at age eight on one of my dad’s ranch horses. Her barn name was Sissy, but I can’t remember her registered name. I got a participation ribbon I hung in my room until I went to college.
2. I rode a Paint for my first horse and I had my first homebred foal, also a Paint, Bubblegum, whose foal I called Tutti Fruiti. As a long yearling, my best friend and I decided we would be the ones to break her out. So we put a halter on her, tied the lead rope to other side of the halter and hopped on bareback. Needless to say, we both got bucked off four times each, but, finally, we were able to ride her around at the walk. Of course, we bragged about it to our parents, and, of course, we were banned from riding her until she was older and broke legitimately.
3. I got my first registered quarter horse at age 12. We called him Joe Blow but his registered name was Bobs Brownie. I showed him in 4H and gymkhanas.
4. I started showing full time at AQHA shows at 14, around the time AQHA started their AJQHA, now AQHYA. We showed showmainship in chaps at first.
5. Susan Johns is my sister and our father, Robert Kieckhefer (pictured left), was President of AQHA from 1976-77. Our dad’s quarter horse racing trainer was Bobby Baffert. My father invented the milk carton, and its pour spout and the corrugated cardboard box. Our brother still owns the family cattle ranch in northern Arizona, where we were all born. Only one sister never got involved in horses.
6. I’ve been married to my husband, Jerry, for 41 years. We have two sons. Both did walk trot, then, only one son went on to ride pleasure then reining horses until his back was injured. Our other son (pictured right) is in the music industry, playing on the David Letterman and Conan O’Brien shows.
7. I have an MBA and was a Vice President at Bank of America. My husband was a Senior Vice President of First Interstate Bank, now known as Wells Fargo Bank.
8. I attended my first Quarter Horse Congress in 1992. Growing up showing, I never showed outside the state of Arizona.
9. I won my first AQHA World Championship at age 52, after 44 years of showing horses. I won one AQHA High Point award in Amateur Western Riding with Flashy Attraction and was AQHA Reserve High Point All Around Amateur with RA Undisputed.
10. My motto: Keep showing, don’t give up. Next year, I will have been showing for 60 years.
Wow…60 years! Thanks, Kathy, for sharing more about yourself with our readers.
