A strong family tree helped Clarke Steacy branch out
by Matthew Lomon
When veteran pacer Midnight Mood crossed the wire a half-length clear on April 29 at Flamboro Downs, his devoted conditioner Clarke Steacy watched on with pride and gratitude.
On paper, it was Steacy’s first career training win. But in reality, it was simply the first with his name listed in the program.
While the thrill of victory is always cherished by the son of O’Brien Award-winning trainer Mark Steacy, sharing it with family is what gives it meaning.
“My wife [Cara Steacy] and I have been training horses outside of working for my dad for 12-to-15 years now – it’s always nice winning together,” Clarke said.
“My sister-in-law [Crystal Johnston] owns that horse, too. She claimed him a little while back when she was going to race him at Rideau Carleton, but after they shut down, the horse got sent to me. He’s a family horse right now and it was nice to get a win with him.”
The 8-year-old JK Endofanera bay out of Rockin Image mare La Diabla spent all of 2025 racing for Clarke’s father-in-law Jamie Johnston, mostly in the $8,500 claimer ranks at Rideau, reeling in nearly $40,000 in prizes.
The Johnstons lost Midnight Mood to a claim near the end of his productive campaign, but Crystal returned to Rideau to re-acquire the sturdy winner of over $180,000 lifetime.
“He’s a great big horse,” Clarke said. “Big, big, strong horse. If he puts his mind to it, he can take a lot of air, he can go a long way. He’s a big, old grinding kind of guy.”
That’s exactly how a determined Midnight Mood reached the winner’s circle on that memorable Wednesday night at Flamboro.
“I had a pretty good feeling that he was going to get there right around the three-quarter pole,” Clarke said, adding with a laugh, “He didn’t end up winning by any more than he had to, but he probably had it in the back of his mind that he was going to get his big nose out there in front of everybody.
“He’s the type of horse that does his job. He’s very good-gaited. He’s so big that you wouldn’t think he’d be able to get around a half-mile track like Flamboro but he did. Crystal was over the moon to get him back and get that one on the board.”
Midnight Mood’s hard-earned triumph in 1:57-flat came nearly six years after the first horse to ever compete under Clarke’s name faced the gate in June 2020.
That horse, a now retired 9-year-old trotting mare named Shiloh Seelster, was one of the countless babies Clarke trained on behalf of his father.
The Royalty For Life bay showed flashes of excellence at home, but struggled to find her footing as a professional racehorse.
“Cara and I partnered with my dad, and I bought her as a yearling,” Clarke said. “Usually, the babies will go up to my brother [Shawn Steacy] in Guelph when they get to race speed, but I kept her at home, and she actually trained down with some of the best ones that year.
“I thought she was going to really pan out and be something special. Unfortunately, that wasn’t how it ended up going.”
For Clarke, who broke into the industry as a driver and found great success at Rideau, the experience of training his father and brother’s horses, star or not, was invaluable to his growth as an all-around horseman.
“There were a lot of nice young horses that I was able to sit behind and develop with my dad over the years,” Clarke said. “You learn a lot from those kinds of horses, but it teaches you to be a better driver, driving in races and vice versa.
“You learn things in races that you can put onto the track when you’re teaching these young horses how to train. I’m training some of these cheaper-type claiming horses right now, and I enjoy them.”
Every horse to come through the heralded Steacy family racing program started with Clarke and his wife Cara at the Steacy’s Lansdowne Stable in Lansdowne, ON.
On the star-studded list of pacers and trotters was Sunshine Beach, Parisian Blue Chip, Warrawee Xenia, Front Page Story, and the exceptional Sylvia Hanover, who Clarke trained down to 2:15 on their home track.
The do-it-all horseman spent countless hours with the decorated earner of nearly $2.9 million, learning just as much from her as she did him.
“Patience,” Clarke said with a laugh. “That’s the biggest thing she taught me. I’ve really learned that over the years training all horses, but young horses, especially, because they’re just like humans; they have good days and bad days, and they have good traits and bad traits. If you can work with them patiently and stay in the moment to overcome those things, then you can hopefully get the best out of them.
“Sylvia was not an easy horse to train down. Her laziness could really frustrate you, and we’ve even seen it in some of her biggest races, but she was a superstar – she knew how to overcome it. Some horses don’t know how to overcome it, but she does.”
His time with a megastar didn’t inflate his expectations for every horse that followed – rather it reinforced what Clarke already knew.
“They all have different attitudes; they’re not one and the same,” he said. “You like to have your own training regimens for the whole stable, but certain individuals won’t fit the same program as others. Some need to be trained a little differently, and you can’t just expect every horse is going to fall into place on one set of principles.
“I think the best trainers adapt to the horse, and they find different training regimens to fit each one.”
As he learned with Shiloh Seelster, not all horses that show promise training down translate on the track. Others, like Sylvia Hanover, are to some degree, anomalies.
Between the two paths, though, is the space you can control – and when that part is handled with care, the rest tends to take care of itself.
“You never know exactly what you’re getting into,” Clarke said. “Some things end up being easier when you don’t expect it to happen, and sometimes it’s the opposite. Sometimes you have to work twice as hard at it because things just don’t go your way.
“When it comes down to it, you take your time with them, try to teach them everything the right way, try to make sure they have lots of foundation underneath them, that they’re healthy and happy, and the majority of them will end up rewarding you in the long run.”
In the present, Clarke remains committed to building a stable of his own with Cara.
While he still helps out his father, who does the same in return, Clarke recently relocated to Guelph in search of more opportunities to fuel his passion of working with young horses.
As he embarks on his latest adventure, with Cara by his side, the legacy-continuing horseman will carry with him what’s always mattered most to Team Steacy: each other.
“Everything I’ve learned, I’ve learned from my dad and my brother – they’re fantastic horsemen,” Clarke said.
“Even though I’m branching off on my own, my wife and I will always help him [my dad] out with anything he needs, and he will always help me and my brother.
“We all work together – it’s one, big happy family.”
