Dusky Lynn Hall is a 10-year-old superstar in the world of barrel racing. Her fearlessness and undivided devotion to mastering her craft have made her a well-respected jockey before she was even a teenager.
The Huntsville, Texas cowgirl has won on all stages and has a barn full of incredible horsepower. Even at Dusky’s young age, she knows she has to take care of the horses that take care of her. The Hall family has been firm believers in SUCCEED® for many years. They know that success starts on the inside, and they trust SUCCEED® to keep their equine athletes feeling their best year-round.
Fearless and Focused
Dusky Lynn had been around barrel racing from her mom and her grandma who both trained barrel horses. She wasn’t very old when she announced to her parents she wanted to run barrels. However, Dusky Lynn didn’t just want to run barrels at small jackpots in the peewee class like most five-year-olds, she wanted to run on the biggest stages there were.
“I was about 5 years old, and I was watching London Gorham at the American, and I told my mom I wanted to run at the American and win the million.”
From that moment on, Dusky Lynn’s mom, Dusky Dawn, went to work trying to find horses that would help her daughter have the right stepping stones to achieve her dreams. It was important to Dusky Dawn that her daughter never had her confidence taken away by being on too much horse. She wanted her to be the one to ask for more speed and ask for more speed she did!
“I would buy her horses and she would surpass their ability in 6 months, she was just a natural. I would give the horses calming supplements before a run and she came to me and asked why I was slowing her horse down.”
Dusky Lynn knew exactly what she wanted from a young age, and she had parents that were going to help her achieve it. Dusky’s fearlessness and her will to win laid the groundwork for her already incredibly successful career.
Superstar in the Making
Since that day when she was five, proclaiming she wanted to run at the American, Dusky Lynn has been on a fast track to achieving that goal. She has qualified for the American three years in a row, from the age of seven. Last year she came mighty close to making her million-dollar dreams a reality by making it all the way to Globe Life Field in the American Semi Finals.
“When she was five, she said she wanted to win the million at the American, since then we have been trying to put the pieces together to make that happen.”
Dusky Lynn’s greatest accomplishment in her young career came last year in Las Vegas when she was nine. At the Vegas Toughest race, Dusky Lynn and her horse Ain’t Seen Famous Yet, better known as Wally, walked away with a brand-new truck when the dust settled. Between all of her horses, Dusky was able to pocket about $75,000 before they headed back to Texas.
Not only is Dusky Lynn a fierce competitor who devotes many hours to mastering her craft. She is also a normal ten-year-old who has the responsibility of school. Dusky is homeschooled so that she can have time to ride all her horses while still getting a quality education. Education is very important to Dusky Lynn’s parents, and it is priority. To give her the best at-home academic experience, they hired a retired substitute teacher, that teaches Dusky and gives her the attention she would receive in a public school. First thing every morning Dusky does her schoolwork for 4-5 hours a day. Once her studies are done, she will spend about eight hours in the barn taking care of her horses and riding. This schedule would be a strenuous one for most adults, but Dusky has found a balancing act.
SUCCEED® for Every Horse
The Hall family was first introduced to SUCCEED® 14 years ago, before Dusky Lynn was even born. It was originally recommended to them for a horse they were vet checking that had some digestive issues. About four years ago, Dusky Dawn incorporated SUCCEED® back into their program and has never looked back.
“We had bought a mare named Zetta, if her stomach was right, you couldn’t outrun her. But if her stomach wasn’t right, she would run three to four tenths off.”
In addition to not running like her normal self, Zetta also would not eat on the road. If being hauled, the Hall family’s knew Zetta had to have her digestive health taken care of in order to perform at her best. After seeing what a difference SUCCEED® made in Zetta, it was an easy decision to put all Dusky Lynns good horses on SUCCEED® to give them all the competitive advantage of good digestive health.
“It takes a full team. My job is keeping them with the best nutrition and supplements. We put them in the trailer a lot, you must prioritize gut health because just being in the trailer creates acid.”
Dusky Dawn knew how important gut health was in their equine partners, but after the hard lessons learned with Zetta, it made her take it even more seriously. She knew that as Dusky Lynn got better horses down the road and became even more competitive, gut health would become even more critical to her success.
In addition to SUCCEED® being a key component in making Dusky Lynn’s string run harder, and stay eating on the road, it also made the stress of competition and hauling easier on the older horses that they had in the trailer. It’s no secret it takes more to keep an older horse going, and prioritizing their gut health was one of the ways the Hall family kept their older horses happy and healthy.
“I have seen proof of SUCCEED® in our horses when you mess up and take them off of it, then you put them back on it and they win against 800 horses. You only make that mistake once.”
As Dusky Lynn gets older, she only becomes more competitive and acquires more accolades. With her devotion to becoming not only a winning barrel racer, but a better horseman, she will be unstoppable. The Hall family will be the first to say it takes a team, and a variety of key components to win at the level Dusky Lynn has. And for them, part of those key components is SUCCEED®.
