“There’s nothing more exciting than watching your own horse run and win.”
Born in Smith Center, Kansas, in 1935, Randall D. Hubbard was the youngest of eight children. He worked in his family’s icehouse and attended Butler College in El Dorado, Kansas. Upon graduation, he became a teacher.
Hubbard left teaching to become a glass salesman in 1959. Nine years later, he became president of Safelite Auto Glass. In 1978, he formed his own company, AFG Industries, which he helped to grow into the second largest glass manufacturer in North America.
Hubbard’s career in horse racing began in the 1960s when he became a partner in Ruidoso Downs. He helped create the National Thoroughbred Racing Association, and as a member of NTRA’s board of directors, he co-founded its Racing Integrity and Drug Testing Task Force.
In 1988, Hubbard purchased Ruidoso Downs Race Course and was granted a license to build a new race track in Kansas City, Kansas. The Woodlands was the first dual race track opened in America, with one track for greyhounds and another for horses. In addition, Hubbard has been chairman of Hollywood Park, Multnomah Kennel Club and Turf Paradise. In 2003, he headed a group that was awarded license to build Zia Park Race Track.
Hubbard joined with AQHA president Jim Helzer to reopen the Hondo Ranch in New Mexico in 2003. Hubbard is founder of the R. D. and Joan Dale Hubbard Foundation, formed in 1986; The Shoemaker Foundation, formed in 1991; and the Hubbard Museum of the American West in Ruidoso Downs, New Mexico.
Hubbard campaigned many great American Quarter Horses over his 40-plus year career, including 14 champions and winners of more than 65 American Quarter Horse stakes races. He served for many years on the AQHA Racing Committee and a term on the AQHA Racing Council. He was awarded the AQHA Racing Council Lifetime Achievement Award, the AQHA Gordon Crone Special Achievement Award, the Jockey Guild Merit Award, the California Equine Retirement Foundation Award of Merit and was honored as Man of the Year by the National Thoroughbred Racing Association in 2000.
R. D. Hubbard was inducted into the American Quarter Horse Hall of Fame in 2009. He died April 29, 2020, at his home in Palm Desert, California.
Biography updated as of May 2020.