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and had to be returned to petitioners in December 1981.
According to petitioners, it then took nearly a year to reverse
certain undesirable training that Docs Fancy Feat had received in
Arizona. Mrs. Sullivan then suffered two different ankle
injuries, each precluding riding for 6 months, sometime during
the period between late 1982 and the end of 1985, although
petitioners' testimony is too vague to pinpoint the time with any
precision. Docs Fancy Feat suffered a leg injury in 1987, was
required to avoid competition for an extended period, and then
reinjured the leg in 1988, becoming permanently crippled.
Petitioners' explanations are not entirely convincing. Mrs.
Sullivan's pregnancy, Docs Fancy Feat’s unfortunate episode in
Arizona, and his retraining took place during 1981 and 1982.
These were the 2 years in which petitioners earned significant
profits. With Mrs. Sullivan unable to ride and Docs Fancy Feat
experiencing remedial training, how did they do so? The record
does not disclose. Moving to 1983 through 1985, if Mrs.
Sullivan's ability to ride was interrupted for two 6-month
periods, did petitioners seek another rider for Docs Fancy Feat,
as they did for the Futurity competition in 1979, and attempted
in 1981? According to the record, there was nothing wrong with
Docs Fancy Feat from 1983, when he was 7, until sometime in 1987,
when he was 10, and yet the horse generated no profits during
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