My friend Jennie and her then-husband Neil kept a team of mighty Clysdale draft horses at their farm in Jack London Park in Glen Ellen, California. They were a familiar site around Northern California, transporting brides at weddings, fair-goers, appearing at all manner of events where people would marvel at the nearly one ton horses. When my husband moved into an office with an extra door and asked for a large painting to hang and cover it, Jennie and I sat down one day with some very large canvases and began painting the Clysdales. The power of these big horses comes roaring off the page here, as it does each Fall at the Draft Horse Classic held in Nevada City. We rode these horses down Doran Beach on the Sonoma Coast bareback and power is the decided feeling you experience. There's a saying at the Classic: "If You Can't Run With The Big Horses, Just Stay In The Barn." This painting captures that feeling precisely.