Mary Ormsby, Equine Operations Manager at Claiborne Farm

Episode 2: Horses, memos, and missions: Managing life at Claiborne Farm

Mary was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee and has been a self-proclaimed "horse girl" since birth. That love led her to Fort Collins, Colorado where she majored in equine science with a business management minor from Colorado State University. During school, the interned at Valley Oak Ranch in Oakdale, CA, a stallion station that serviced working ranch and cutting horse Quarter Horse stallions. Post graduation, she interned at Wagonhound Land and Livestock in Douglas, Wyoming and eventually landed an internship at Claiborne Farm in 2012. After completing a breeding season internship and a sale prep internship, Mary stayed on full time as a broodmare groom. After deciding she simply wasn't going to leave Claiborne, she worked several seasons as the farm's resident vet technician before being promoted to Assistant Broodmare Manager, where she worked alongside some of the best in the business.

Mary's current job title at Claiborne is Equine Operations Manager, a job that combines managing the farm's sale consignment, client updates, internal memos, record keeping, assisting the farm manager and farm president, and many other tasks. Mary is also an advocate for retired racehorses, serving on the Industry Outreach Committee for the Retired Racehorse Project for which she is also the farm liaison, and has her own small herd of OTTBs, including Betweenhereandcool, her graded stakes placed war horse who is now learning to be a jumper.