A 25 Year Journey: Highpoint Performance Horses 2025 Futurity Standout

When things are meant to be, they are simply meant to be and this team's journey was long-destined for the winner's circle

Teal Stoll | Feb 7, 2025

HP Hotrod / Photo courtesy of Jason Martin / Photographer Bee Silva

Jason Martin and Charlie Cole are familiar names in the barrel racing industry today, but that is not where they got their start in the horse business. With deep roots in the world of quarter horse showing, they own and operate Highpoint Performance Horses in Pilot Point, Texas.

I caught up with Jason Martin about their standout futurity stallion for the 2025 season, HP Hotrod. Not only did they raise the beautiful stallion, there is much more to their history together. "Boomer" has earned $120,000 so far with trainer and jockey Ashley Schafer, only two months into the futurity season.

Martin explained how Highpoint first got involved with the speed events, "In probably 1999, Charlie and I wanted to get a hobby. We were in judged events our entire life in the horse show world, so we thought, 'Let’s do barrel racing and pole bending,' because it’s just timed and it’s fun. A lot of the quarter horse shows at that time had poles and barrels."

While many know Martin and Cole from their ownership of Slick By Design, who had an incredibly successful career and shined at multiple National Finals Rodeos with Michele McLeod, that was not their first trip to the big stage.

"Charlie bought FQH A Sharp Move. He was a pole bending horse from back east and he was super nice. I was doing poles on him and Charlie started doing some barrel racing on him. All of a sudden, he was winning races. Kristin Weaver (Brown) is a really good friend of ours, so we told her she should try Boomer and he won his very first rodeo with her."

"That summer she was trying to qualify for the National Finals Rodeo, so she leased them from us and was on the road with Charmayne (James). As the summer started, Kristin didn't really need him and Charmayne did, so she leased him. She won Cheyenne on him in his very first year and we were in the stands for the finals. She got the buckle and rode up and handed it to us and it was a really cool thing for us. She ended up using him in the tenth round of the NFR, so that was our first NFR experience."

Needless to say, Martin and Cole were hooked. They wanted more barrel horses.

"We bought his full sister, which happened to be Rods Last Ladybug. We bought her for like $1,200 and I think she was a yearling. “Boomette” and Kristin (Weaver-Brown) went on to win the AQHA Jr. World Championships."

Although they sold Boomette a few years later to continue her rodeo career with Whitney Baker, her first foal was a standout.

"We had bred her to Dash Ta Fame and got Rockette Ta Fame. She won the World Championship, Junior World Championship, and Congress with PJ Burger. So right off the bat, Boomette was a world champion and her first baby was a world champion."

"A few years went by and I asked Whitney if we could buy an embryo. We bred her to Dash Ta Fame and actually got twin flushes, so then I said 'Can I just buy the mare?' so I bought her back. We got Rollin In The Fame and she sold to Brazil and became the world record holder on a standard pattern. Then more recently, we had HP Rollin Rollin and Chrome Plated Fame (“Johnny”), who has earned over $175,000 with Ashley Schafer."

"Then we got Hotrod. I didn’t want another Dash Ta Fame stud, so he was on the gelding list. Christi (Christensen, Highpoint's breeding manager) called me as they were gelding that day and he was next in line. She said “Have you seen him lately?” She didn’t think we should geld him, so we didn't. I spent his whole yearling year trying to sell him for $50,000. No one was interested. It was really just meant to be that we kept him."

Boomer not only got to keep his manhood, he was staying at Highpoint and went into training.

"As a two-year-old, I sent him to Zach Curran and then he went to Ashley Schafer. I was really into keeping him for the five-year-old futurities and she was like 'No, he’s ready!' It is so easy for him. He never looks like he is running or working hard. He has something special."

Boomer has already earned championships and reserve championships at some of the biggest futurities and slot races in the country. Not all colts begin their career under such immense pressure, but Schafer and Highpoint knew he had what it took. Boomer started his futurity season at the famed $uper$takes at the Barrel Futurities of America World Championships. He was a money earner on his first competition run ever - in one of the most intense environments a performance horse will ever face.

For Between The Reins members, many have followed Boomer's journey for the past year on the training platform with Schafer. There are two unique sets of challenges for a futurity horse and a stallion in competition, but that can so easily be taken for granted. When we see a young stallion able to shine this early in his career, it is a true testament to their ability and talent. A great horse placed with great trainers will always equal more greatness, just as it has in this case.

While specialized barrel racing bloodlines have only been a conscientious effort for roughly the past two decades, we see time and again how monumental that positive reach has been. Boomer will now offer his own elite genetics to the industry, with limited ICSI breedings available in 2025. For more information about Highpoint Performance Horses, please check out their website and follow them on Facebook to keep up with all of Boomer's adventures.

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