Silver Train Makes Gold for Ryans

TDN HEADLINE NEWS Article appeared in TDN on May 20, 2015

The husband-and-wife team of Crystal and Marcus Ryan, which consigns as Mason Springs, celebrated its
biggest sales success to date when selling hip 468, a colt by Silver Train, for $125,000 to the bid of trainer
Gary Contessa.

We work for Darley in the mornings and we ride out for Tim Jones down in Aiken in the pre-training and then we do our
own horses on the farm at home, explained Marcus Ryan. The couple, married for three years now, have pinhooked one
horse a year for the last four years. They were able to purchase the Silver Train colt for $7,500 at last year=s Midlantic
Fall sale on the advice of Chris Welker. We bought him outside the ring and through some friends who put us in the right direction, Ryan explained. I was looking at another horse, but he went for too much money and Crystal told me I had to come
down and look at this horse. She is 100% a great judge of horses.

Crystal Ryan acknowledged she had big hopes leading the colt into the ring Tuesday, but the final We were thinking around $50-60,000, she said. We knew we had something special, but being by Silver Train we weren’t sure what would happen. Asked if this was the couple’s biggest success, Crystal Ryan said, By far. This is all of the rest of them put together.
Crystal Ryan is a Michigan native who had been riding reining horses before transitioning to Thoroughbreds. Marcus Ryan is a transplanted Irishman who had been involved in steeple chasing. The morning we bought our first horse is the day we
got engaged, Marcus Ryan recalled. A friend of ours told me, you know it’s serious when you buy a yearling together, the ring is definitely coming, Crystal Ryan laughed. That just seals it. Marcus proposed to me here in Timonium

Author: Henry Nothhaft

Owner of HnR Nothhaft Horseracing LLC Check out Hank's biography on Linked-In www.linkedin.com/in/henryrnothhaft