From $250 Bargain to $13,000 Triumph: The Inspiring Story of Woody Be Metallic and Neil Flynn

Most horse lovers don’t compete for the prize money - it’s often just a bonus. But when a horse that only costs $250 brings $13,000 home from his first event, it’s extra sweet.

Woody Be Metallic, owned by Neil and Donna Flynn, did just that in three non-professional futurity finals at Tamworth in 2023. Neil, who lives at Casino in the Northern Rivers area of New South Wales, says Woody, as he is known around the stables, is a one-of-a-kind horse.

“Woody was a horse that I bought out of the Gympie Horse Sale,” he tells Horse Deals. “I got him for $250. When I bought him, he was only four months old. He was very hairy and full of worms. He looked terrible, but I knew of his bloodlines - I knew he had good bloodlines.”

Woody is a 14.2hh chestnut with two white socks. He is by Metallic Echo out of Boobook Barbies Cat. “I proceeded to get him registered, which took a lot of work. We wormed him and let him grow out,” Neil recalls. “We got him going, and I broke him in myself. I have trained him myself, with the help of Phil Dawson, he is my mentor. I use him all the time to help me through. 

“Between all of that, we got into the futurity, and there were 71 in his class from all around Australia, and he got in the final of three futurities, and in the big one, he came third. “He won $13,000 at that first show.”

The star in the making has a big future ahead of him, and the Flynns are excited to see how he continues to grow and perform. “He was three years old at the futurity, and he’s four now. Hopefully, we will be taking him back to Tamworth this year, and he’ll be in the derby event this time around,” Neil says.

“He’s just a really easy horse. Breaking him in, because he has that Metallic breeding in him, he was just a good horse. He’s been 100 per cent all the way along. He’s a thinking horse. You teach him something, and it stays with him.”

Age is no barrier for Neil, who has no plans to sit on the sidelines out of the saddle. “I am lucky. This year, I’ll be 79 when I cross the timeline,” he says. “I have a horse for next year; he’s a little horse we bred ourselves this year. He’s by Shines Like Metallic, out of a mare we own called Streetwalker. “I’ve broken him in and started him. At this stage, I’m really happy with him. He’s a little horse but very smart. We are going to call him Metallic Street.”

Planning ahead gives Neil and Donna something to look forward to.

“I’ll be 80 when I ride Metallic Street across the timeline in 2025. I’ve loved horses all my life. It is my dream,” he says. “I have been very blessed to have good health; that’s one of the good things. I don’t take any tablets or anything like that. At this stage, I can have a few beers at the end of each day, and I just get on with it. I really enjoy life. I ride if I can every day. If I want to get these horses to the show, I have to. That keeps me fit. 

“We’ve got shows coming up within the next month, so we’ll be off showing again.” Neil says he gets up at 6 am every morning to work on the farm and ride. “I will keep riding for as long as I can,” he says. “I keep thinking about retirement, but I don’t know what I would do. I just can’t imagine myself in a caravan park sitting back and listening to everyone.”

He says he loves going to shows and catching up with lifelong friends he has made over the years. “The cutting world isn’t a really big world. You go to the futurity, and you nearly know everyone there … maybe it’s because I’ve been around so long. The encouragement that people give you is unbelievable. It helps you get up in the morning.” 

And despite Woody’s early success, there are no plans to sell him for what one could expect to be big dollars. “At this stage, he’s not leaving. He’s just such a nice horse. We’ll keep showing him, and my wife looks like she might want to show him this year. We’ll share him,” Neil says. “Because we both do it together, that makes it all worthwhile. It’s a combined passion that we have. “I get heaps of comments about him. They say he’s a good horse.”

Neil says he couldn’t do what he did without the support of Dawson and the team he has around him. “I had a fantastic team helping - I had Phil, Lincoln Verart, Steve Smith and Roger Wagner,” he says. “Basically, the helping team is what makes you. We had spent weeks before with them. You go there as a team; you never just do cutting by yourself. It’s very much a team sport.”

Article: Rachael Houlihan

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