JL Cruze, Homicide Hunter, Sevruga, Mariner Seelster and Lettucerockthem A among 124 horses entered Sept. 18-20 at the Horse Park of New Jersey.
Allentown, NJ – Preliminary entries are in for the 32nd annual National Standardbred Horse Show Presented by Purple Haze Standardbred Adoption Program, and the list will look familiar to anyone who follows harness racing. A total of 124 horses have made 1,400 class entries for the three-day show, set for Sept. 18-20 at the Horse Park of New Jersey, with several former millionaires on the track among them.
Classes run 8 a.m. each day across dressage, driving, hunters, jumpers, western, gymkhana, in-hand and trail. The Adoptable Horse classes and War Horse In Hand are on Sunday, Sept. 20.
“These horses gave their connections years of great racing, and now they are showing everyone what comes next,” said Colleen Nolan-Tran, Vice President of SPHO-NJ. “We hope horsemen come out and see them.”
War horses to watch
A few of the millionaires entered this year:
JL Cruze retired at the end of 2025 at the mandatory age of 14 as a double millionaire, with 75 wins in 273 starts and just over $2 million in earnings. “The King” was the 2015 Dan Patch Older Male Trotter, the first horse to trot a sub-1:50 mile at The Meadowlands (1:49.4), and topped $100,000 in nine seasons. He was trained by Eric Ell and co-owned by the late Kenny Wood, whose friends have made gifts in his memory to this year’s show.
At the show: Erin Brown will show JL Cruze Sunday in War Horse In Hand, Geldings In Hand and Fresh Off The Track In Hand.
Homicide Hunter became the fastest trotter in harness racing history in 2018 with a 1:48.4 win in the Allerage Farms Open Trot at The Red Mile, a mile that also lowered JL Cruze’s mile-track record for gelding trotters. The Mr Cantab gelding was named 2018 Dan Patch Older Male Trotter, won the Breeders Crown and Hill Memorial, and retired with $1,761,577 for Crawford Farms Racing. He now shows with the MMXX Standardbreds team in partnership with Crawford Farms.
At the show: Homicide Hunter is entered with five different riders. He will do dressage on Friday; English pleasure, hunter under saddle, equitation and the Pacing for the Cure Challenge on Saturday; and western pleasure, ranch, showmanship and War Horse In Hand on Sunday, where he will share the ring with JL Cruze.
Sevruga is a New Jersey-bred trotter who banked $1.2 million over 135 starts. On Open Space Pace Day in 2015 he set a world record for a mile and a half on a half-mile track, going wire to wire in 3:00 at Freehold Raceway for trainer Julie Miller and driver Andy Miller.
At the show: Sevruga has traded the sulky for speed events. Mackenzie Puterbaugh will ride him Friday night in the Sam McKee Memorial Open Barrel Race, Open Barrel Dash, Open Pole Bending and Open Keyhole, then in War Horse In Hand, Geldings In Hand and western pleasure on Sunday.
Mariner Seelster, an Ontario-bred son of Camluck bred by Seelster Farms, made more than 440 starts and became a millionaire at age 15 when he won a Meadowlands Amateur Driving Club race in February 2024 with Tony Beltrami. He raced most of his career for Mark Ford before finishing with trainer Travis Alexander. He is now one of the five ReBrand Initiative Trainer’s Challenge horses and is available for adoption.
At the show: His ReBrand trainer, Michaela Schock, will show Mariner Seelster in the Rookie English and Rookie Hunter divisions on Saturday, including crossrail and fences classes, plus War Horse English Pleasure. On Sunday he goes in War Horse In Hand and all three Adoptable Horse classes.
Lettucerockthem A was a Group 1 winner in Australia, where the Art Major gelding held the national two-year-old mile record, before racing in North America, where he won a division of the George Morton Levy Memorial Series at Yonkers in 1:51. He made more than 200 starts, earned over $1 million and retired in 2022. He came to Kristina Hendrickson-Russell of Flamingo Equine in Indiana through Safe Harbor Standardbreds, and is also a ReBrand Trainer’s Challenge horse and available for adoption.
At the show: Lettucerockthem A has a full Sunday: western pleasure and discipline rail, War Horse Ranch Pleasure, ranch pleasure and ranch riding, trail, in-hand and the Adoptable Horse classes.
ReBrand Initiative Trainer’s Challenge finale
The ReBrand Initiative, an independent nonprofit focused on Standardbred aftercare, will wrap up its inaugural Trainer’s Challenge at the National Standardbred Horse Show Presented by Purple Haze Standardbred Adoption Program. The challenge paired five professional trainers with five retired Standardbreds from aftercare programs across the country, giving each team three months to retrain its horse for a new discipline. Every horse in the challenge is adoptable, including two of the millionaires featured above: Mariner Seelster, trained and shown by Michaela Schock, and Lettucerockthem A, trained and shown by Kristina Hendrickson-Russell of Flamingo Equine. Trainers have earned points through social media challenges and training updates, and ReBrand will use placings from classes at the show to award the final points and name its first Trainer’s Challenge champion. Learn more at rebrandinitiative.org.
Adoptable horses
Ten adoptable horses are entered in Sunday’s Adoptable Horse division, which offers free entries and stabling: All That Class, Chapamando, Gretsky The Great, HeyBatterBatter, Lettucerockthem A, Mariner Seelster, Master Clave, Nikola J, Ricks Sign and Son of a Lynx. Adoptable horses will be stabled together in a prominent spot, and both rings will hold during the adoptable classes. Anyone interested in adopting can stop by the barn any time or see the listings at our adoptable horses page.
Vendors and food trucks
Vendors and food trucks will be on site all three days. See who is coming at vendor list.
Thank you to the racing community
The show is supported by many harness racing partners, including the United States Trotting Association, which sponsors the War Horse and Fresh Off The Track divisions, along with Sam Landy/Congress Hill Farm, the Standardbred Breeders & Owners Association of New Jersey, The Meadowlands Racetrack, the Hambletonian Society, Hanover Shoe Farms and many more. See the full list of sponsors at our sponsor list.
The full schedule, class list and live results will be posted at nationalshow.sphonj.org.
For questions about the show, contact Debra McCluskey, Show Office Manager, at 609-203-6142 or debralmccluskey@yahoo.com.
The USTA will be there not only to show support for our off-track horses, but also to assist current or new enrollees in the Standardbred Incentive Program (SIP). Read more.
About SPHO-NJ
The Standardbred Pleasure Horse Organization of New Jersey promotes the Standardbred breed and its second careers beyond the racetrack, hosting the National Standardbred Horse Show Presented by Purple Haze Standardbred Adoption Program each fall at the Horse Park of New Jersey.