Kerry Thomas is a pioneer in the field of equine athletic psychology and herd dynamics. He created his company The Thomas Herding Technique (THT) in 2008. Kerry’s work with thoroughbred horses has garnered increasing interest from horse owners, trainers and breeders. His services are used in a variety of ways: claiming a horse, breeding decisions, pre-purchase evaluations and finding ways to unlock the true potential in an underachieving horse. Thomas uses an innovative approach when doing his yearly analysis of the Kentucky Derby field. He focuses on the horse’s emotional and mental intelligence when identifying which ones he likes and dislikes to win the race. Exciting new efforts are currently being made by Kerry and the THT Director of Equine Services, Pete Denk, into the study of how emotional stress in a horse affects their physical performance. Kerry Thomas resides in Cochranville, Pennsylvania, but is usually travelling around the country in a quest to dig deeper into the equine mind.
Kerry, can you give me a brief synopsis on the research you do in the field of equine psychology and how it fits into the world of horse racing?
In a nutshell, my job is to discover ‘who’ the horse is. Mental/Emotional Conformation & Herd Dynamic profiling breaks down into two areas:
1. Mental/Emotional profiling examines the individual sensory system and the overall mental soundness and efficiency of the horse.
2. Herd Dynamic profiling is ascertaining the likely natural position and abilities of the individual horse within a herd environment or a race.
The most relevant question we’re trying to answer is does the horse have the sensory soundness, psychology and Herd Dynamics profile to optimize its physical ability? You can have yourself one well-built freight train, but you still need the right conductor (the mind).
You’ve recently launched a new website, thtbloodstock.com. What was the inspiration behind it?
Our work is evolving, and we want to have a landing page on the web for people to find out about us or contact us.
One area of the site focuses on services you offer for race horse owners, breeders and trainers. In what ways is your understanding of the equine mind beneficial to your clientele?
The mental capacity of the equine controls the physical output of the athlete. There are many horses with the physical tools to run fast. Often the difference between average, good, and great is mental. The ability to assess a horse’s mental and behavioral traits is a big piece of the puzzle in racing and breeding.
You take pride in helping your clients find success when others have been more keen to “throw in the towel” on an underachieving horse who just needs a little deeper understanding. I’ve heard you referred to as the “Money Ball” of horse racing. Briefly describe your process for finding these horses’ untapped potential.
This aspect of our business is among the more challenging and interesting. It includes film study and performance profiling for clients seeking to claim or buy a horse that could have improvement in it, or helping to unravel an underachiever for the current owner.
The process is different with every horse. We recently worked with a horse who got stuck in the gate. After finding its sensory strengths and weaknesses and determining which of the senses the horse defaulted to under stress, I began to narrow the field of culprits. Taking this information I then went and stood in the gate and went through the process of breaking, armed with the knowledge of the horses’ sensory system and interpretation ability, and thus discovered the likely cause. The information was given to the trainer, a minor adjustment was made, and the horse broke like a bullet and received its gate card. That’s one example. There are so many small things that make big differences. Often you find clues in subtleties.
Another piece of your website is geared towards your analysis of each year’s Kentucky Derby. You’ve had tremendous success pointing out greatness in Animal Kingdom, I’ll Have Another, Orb and California Chrome. What did you see in each of these horses that told you they had a real chance to win The Run for the Roses?
Animal Kingdom stuck out for his influence of other horses in motion and his impressive growth pattern.
I’ll Have Another had a mind for the Derby distance and he was growing with every race, meeting every new challenge. That is a common theme with Derby winners.
Orb also had that unique growth pattern heading into the Derby. He also had the perfect skill set to take advantage of the conditions he faced on Derby day. As it turned out, that was his apex.
California Chrome caught our attention when he suddenly improved by leaps and bounds late in his two-year-old season and early in his three-year-old campaign. He learned to attack space, to impose his will on a horse race. In terms of herd dynamics, he was way ahead of his peers on the first Saturday of May.
Typically how much of a derby field can you cross off due to a horse’s lack of mental capacity to run 1 ¼ miles with 19 other horses in the race?
You can cross off more than 50% of the field every year on mental/behavioral traits. In our Derby report, we produce a list of horses that we think have what it takes to win. Our top tier of contenders has averaged two horses a year, and so far the winner has come from our top tier every year. Obviously that will be hard to keep up. Anything can happen in a horse race. But there is no other race that puts such unique mental demands on the competitors.
The Kentucky Derby has turned out to be one of the very best applications of Herd Dynamics and mental/emotional conformation.
When did you begin to translate your work and research into the world of racing and why?
Even before I realized it, my body of work was quite geared towards racing. Then I slowly but surely began to focus on herd dynamics, psychology, communication, and hierarchy, all as they related to herd motion.
It was just as much personal evolution as anything. When I looked at all the equine sports, racing in its purest form is a herd of horses in motion. This is natural. Horses love to run. In my opinion, there is no other equine sport that is based on natural movement of the horse quite like racing, so the marriage is perfect. For the last three and a half years, THT has gradually turned its focus towards racing, and now is virtually 100% focused on it. I have no thoughts of altering that course.
What do you love most about what you do for a living?
For me it’s always been a sense of discovery that is the force that drives me forward. The peace I feel when in the presence of the horse, coupled with a strong desire to learn makes what I do not a business but a lifestyle. There’s a communal bond between horses and humans that has been ongoing since the partnership began so many years ago in human history. I have a strong desire to be close to that historical bond and understand it on the emotional level that is its root.
You’ve described your profession as to be “like a window into the invisible”. What do you mean by this?
Because if you aren’t paying close attention, you either will not see or will not understand the world of the horse. What we see manifested in physical reaction is very often a result of something else, something layered below, tucked away within the psychology of the horse. It’s a great deal like being a detective looking for esoteric clues. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction much of the time. Sometimes you have to look backward to see forward. The most important tool I use when profiling horses after all the testing, retesting and data collecting, is instinct.
Tell me about your book, “Horse Profiling: The Secret To Motivating Equine Athletes”, and what a fan of horse racing can take from it. Any thoughts of writing another one in the future?
The book was based on the work accumulated up to that point in time, and is to me a good first level understanding. It’s an overview of what my work and research is all about and where it started. Since that time and on the shoulders of that body of work, a great deal has since been discovered. As this is an evolution of learning and breakthroughs for both me professionally and personally, a book about Herd Dynamics, Behavioral Genetic Sequencing, and Sensory Soundness relative to racing is something you can expect one day in the future.
Since this is a pedigree blog, I have a question to ask regarding breeding. What do you look for when it comes to successfully breeding two horses to each other?
It is important to assess the traits the sire and dam possess, so you can understand what they might pass down. Just as many stallions stamp their progeny physically, they also stamp from the mental/behavioral standpoint. And the same goes for broodmares.
A successful breeding from the standpoint of THT’s work is one that preserves mental/behavioral strengths and addresses weaknesses.
Out of the countless number of horses you’ve studied, which are a few who have made you say, “Wow!” and why?
There are so many, but I’ll name a few…
Zenyatta was the first horse that taught me about environmental awareness and environmental control. She also provided an early lesson in the power of Group Herd Dynamic. She would retreat to the back of the pack and take in the entire herd, assessing it all then gradually taking over.
Hat Trick (Jpn) has an ability to target the right horse, even from distance, and drive through that target. He also is an example of a horse that does not waste emotional energy on things that are not consequential. That is a key trait of many high-level horses.
English Channel is proof that size does not matter. He is a tiny horse, but he has amazing heart, grit and presence.
Seeing Wise Dan in the paddock before the 2013 Breeders’ Cup was memorable. He walked around with a swagger and self-assuredness. He seemed to know what was needed to accomplish a task even before it was asked.
Those are just a few moments where a light bulb clicked on.
Are there any new projects in the works at THT Bloodstock for the upcoming year?
Our research is never-ending, and we are advancing on a lot of fronts.
We’ve attended most of the major two-year-old in training sales the last two years, profiling hundreds of horses, monitoring racetrack results, and learning a lot about that unique market sector. We would like to help a few clients tackle the two-year-old sales in the first half of 2015.
The breeding side of the business also should be one of our growth areas. We are constantly profiling new sires and adding them to our database. We have already seen that male horses with high-level minds are more likely to succeed at stud than those with average or low-level minds. We have been able to predict a couple sires that hit (such as Super Saver). When you are ahead of the commercial market in diagnosing which stallions can produce elite progeny, you can get a lot of value at the sales and in the breeding shed. We think we have a lot to offer the stallion market, so that is something we would like to become more involved in.
We already do broodmare band profiling, but looking further ahead, we would like to help plan matings from the standpoint of producing mentally strong foals with good herd dynamic profiles. That is an area we are just beginning to study.