Diné horse trainer earns noteworthy title

WINDOW ROCK

It took many years of learning, training and racing for Tyrell Tsosie to earn a noteworthy title at the Rillito Racetrack.

Tsosie was recently awarded the lead trainer at the historic racetrack in Tucson.

Tsosie said it means a lot to be recognized for the racetrack’s lead trainer, especially coming from the Navajo Nation.

“It’s just never been done, it’s never been heard of,” he said. “I’m pretty sure there’s other people before me that thought about (it) and wanted to achieve this recognition and this title, but it just takes a lot of hard work and dedication to get it done.”

Tsosie is from Teec Nos Pos, Arizona. He is Bit’ahnii born for Tsi’naajinii. His cheii’s clans are Tó’aheedlíinii and nalí’s are Ma’iideeshgiizhinii.

He manages the Taylor’s Flying T Racing.

The family has been raising horses before, but only recently decided to try their hand in horse racing.

Before becoming a horse trainer, he was a talented welder, getting a scholarship while in high school and going to a technical school to further hone his skills.

After that, welding became his profession, working for different business and traveling across the U.S. to work on various projects.

However, Tsosie’s passion remained on horses. He always found peace and comfort with them, whenever he had a bad day. He said being near a horse helps him feel better. He recognizes them as being important to the native culture and Native American history.

“The horses are like our brothers to the Navajos,” Tsosie said. “The horses are what save their world and they are our protectors; we protect them and they protect us…we probably would have had nothing without them. These horses are sacred, or a sacred animal to us Navajos.”

The Tsosie family participated in local races as well as prestigious ones like the annual Little Beaver Pony Express in New Mexico.

Tsosie had always had the dream of becoming a horse trainer, something he yearned for years.

“I’ve seen horse races growing up as a little kid because my cousins raced horses and they would tell me about all these big races that they seen in New Mexico,” Tsosie said, while adding that he got hooked into the sport.

“I could never get away from horse racing,” he said. “I want to be a trainer, and I want to be a good trainer.”

He started learning the ropes, talking to trainers at tracks, looking up information and getting as much experience as he could. Eventually he started training the family horses himself, saying it’s a learning process and there’s always something new to learn.

Tsosie had hopes of becoming a lead trainer but didn’t think it was a possibility as he was focused on his welding career.

Suddenly work dried up in 2020 during the Coronavirus pandemic. Tsosie saw this as an opportunity to work more with his horses. He spent more time training and he started to look for races but due to COVID restrictions on the rez he had to travel far to compete.

Later that year in Wyoming, he competed and won his first race, eventually being recognized as an official horse trainer. Taking inspiration from this, he decided to go after his dream title of becoming the lead horse trainer.

In 2021 he continued racing, winning more races, and in turn winning horse trailers, saddles and buckles, with each achievement brining him closer to his goal.

Finally this year he competed in numerous races in a six-week span from February to early April, winning most of them. And on April 3, the Arizona Horse Racing Association named Tsosie the leading trainer for horse racing at Rillito Park.

“It means a lot to me as a Navajo in particular to achieve the award and be from the reservation,” Tsosie said. “There are many horsemen in the sport on the reservation, I took my dream further and accomplished having a title in the racing world. I’ve never heard of a Navajo to have this award. And that makes me very proud.

“I’m representing our Nation, my tribe, my people and that brings a lot of happiness to me,” he said. “Also I owe a lot of appreciation to the people who helped and encouraged me along the way. ”

With COVID restrictions slowly easing, Tsosie’s old bosses are calling him back to work. But he is busy at the moment, caring for a number of horses that he is training. It may take a while before Tsosie can become a full time trainer, but he now knows it is possible and will continue to peruse it.

He thanks his family, his parents, siblings and now his wife and son for their love and support helping him to reach this new point in his life.

“We were just a small family on the rez that wanted to win races,” he said “And the struggle was hard, but we overcome all the obstacles and now we’re doing good.”

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