There are many organizations who do great work with Standardbred aftercare. The Standardbred Retirement Fund, New Vocations, and even the USTA with its Standardbred Transition Alliance and Full Circle option. But nobody is doing aftercare in as innovative a manner as MMXX Standardbreds. They rescue from kill pens, they arrange homes for horses right off the racetrack, and they train Standardbreds for the show ring. The non-profit actually fields its own team of show riders, which has been wildly successful. Their top Standardbred show horse is the fastest male trotter of all time (and was the fastest in history until last weekend’s Elitlopp when Allegiant went a mile rate of 1:48) Homicide Hunter (1:48 4/5), who was the 2025 Standardbred Pleasure Horse Owners United States Horse of the Year. The team boasts over two dozen 2025 titles. If you caught any of the Washington D.C. Memorial Day Parade on TV on May 25, you saw six of their horses. And 2026 has started out strong, too. Last weekend, competing at the PHHA World Show, a record seven Standardbreds competed in the largest open show in New England. Over 200 horses were entered and Standardbreds ended with 12 wins and four championships. The top performer was (again) Homicide Hunter with four wins (including classes with 15+ entries) and two championships. Next up was Maxie Man with three wins and one championship. Standardbreds swept the top three spots in three classes. Next week, Homicide Hunter heads to Tulsa for the PTHA World Championships. MMXX (the Latin numerals for 2020) Standardbreds is the brainchild of Molly D’Agostino, a Harness Horse Youth Foundation alumnus and a lifelong harness racing participant. “My family has been in it on my mom’s side forever. My uncle was a driver at Vernon Downs. Mom and her sister got into it. They got my dad into it and then I got involved,” said 31-year-old Syracuse native. “I got my groom’s license at 14. I bought my first racehorse in my 20s. ► Sign up for our FREE DRF Harness Digest Newsletter “I moved to Connecticut and bought some property that had room for two horses. We had Fox Valley Photog, who raced until he was 14, and when he retired I brought him home with me,” she continued. “My neighbor was a Quarterhorse person and she helped me break him to ride and I started taking him to shows; just for fun. The show people saw him – he was what they call fancy. First they asked what breed he was, then they asked where they could get a Standardbred.” That was the genesis of the MMXX program - getting retired Standardbreds into the show ring to promote the breed. And it has certainly been successful. “We do all the same things the other programs do – regular check-ins, applications and so on – but we have come up with a model that is scalable and inexpensive. In our program, the owners keep the horse until he is adopted. This allows us to only charge $125 for adoptions and to get the horses heading toward their possible second careers,” D’Agostino explained.  D’Agostino, a Syracuse University graduate, is also an attorney, so all the contract I’s are dotted and the T’s are crossed. D’Agostino received a call a couple years back that a horse her family had been involved with was in trouble (a euphemism for being in a kill pen). She bailed him out and so began another aspect of the MMXX mission. Some of their kill pen rescues have gone on to success in the show ring. The show team is unique and that is a word that is grossly overused. Not here. D’Agostino saw a way to market the breed. “The first year I had two riders and one horse. Because of our success, it attracted a lot of people. At the end of last year, we put out an open call. We got over 60 applicants from all over the country,” said D’Agostino. “Breed bias is really breaking down. People see the Standardbreds perform and they want one. The team membership changes based on what needs to be done. “Riders usually have to pay their own way. We pay the horse expenses, which is why fundraising is so important. The show team is a huge marketing tool and without it we couldn’t do 400 adoptions in 2.5 years. Yes, we are marketing MMXX, but we are also marketing the breed.” D’Agostino trains and breaks most of the horses herself, but recently, Candace DesRochers, a nationally acclaimed Quarterhorse Congress-level trainer has donated a lot of time to the organization. “I’m still learning,” said DesRochers, “and I appreciate the help” In fact, DesRochers’ 10-year-old son will be riding Homicide Hunter in one class at Tulsa. And how did MMXX get such a great horse as Homicide Hunter?  He is owned by Crawford Farms Racing and they owned him when he was racing and setting world records. “Michelle Panebianco is a huge proponent of aftercare and is one of our biggest sponsors (Deja Blu Farms),” D’Agostino said. “She has been amazing and she’s the one who got us the opportunity to show him. She has ‘a million’ retirees. She said that he’s bored out of his mind. Even if he wasn’t good at this new job, it would still be great publicity. He loves having a job. He’s all business. The Judges love him and he’s really good at what he does, “ D’Agostino is a multi-faceted, driven individual. She is also a talented musician, who toured for over 10 years with bands including the All American Rejects and country artist Frankie Ballard. She even recorded an album several years back. “Most of my work was on guitar, but I wasn’t the boss so I wanted to try to be a singer. I didn’t like it that much. I still play as a fill-in sometimes, but the horses take most of my time,” said D’Agostino, who has a goal in mind when it comes to showing horses. “The eventual goal is to win a World Championship with a Standardbred, which is something they are not bred to do. I am so much in my own lane. It is important to make this accessible. It really is for the racing people.” That’s it for this time. Now go cash. I know you can’t wager on horse shows, but maybe Homicide Hunter on Kalshi? See you next time.