On a frigid February morning at Belmont Park, trainers and riders exercise horses inside barn No. 37. A four-year-old bay stands quietly in stall 13, his deltoid head angled just enough to monitor the day's early rituals. At 17 hands high, Call Me Larry is taller than most mature thoroughbreds. His eyes are expressive and his presence immense. So immense that his owner, Suzie O’Cain, had to turn him out for a while when he was three. Now Larry is back, and he’s racing for a cause—a cure for breast cancer.

A six-furlong stretch at Aqueduct Racetrack on Feb. 10 marked Larry's entrance into the racing circuit and the beginning of Suzie O’Cain’s mission to donate 10 percent of his winnings to Evelyn Lauder’s Breast Cancer Research Foundation.

“I’ve just lost too many friends to breast cancer,” O’Cain said. “It’s the most insidious, horrendous disease. … Blend the horses into a worthy cause, it’s a win-win situation.”
    
O'Cain has owned horses all her life. She married her veterinarian C. Lynwood "Doc" O’Cain, and they live on Highcliff Farm, a thoroughbred breeding ranch in the foothills of the Adirondacks. Before running Call Me Larry, O’Cain took a break from horse racing for a few years because of the expense. Her explanation for her return: “I’ve just reached a place where I want to do something, something that matters.”  

O'Cain credits Ron Ceisler, Vice-President of Marketing for New York City Off-Track Betting, for leading her to that something. Ceisler got O’Cain involved in a television segment at Saratoga Race Course called "A.M. Saratoga." That’s when O’Cain met Evelyn Lauder, wife of Estee Lauder chairman Leonard A. Lauder and a senior vice president of the cosmetics company. O'Cain invited Lauder onto the morning show along with Dr. Larry Norton, the Breast Cancer Research Center's top physician. “Call me Larry,“ Norton told O'Cain repeatedly during the interview. "Call me Larry!” That gave O'Cain the idea for her colt's name.

After Call Me Larry, O’Cain got a new stable name, Find A Cure Stable, and new silks with the pink ribbon—a trademark of the National Breast Cancer Foundation and a symbol of breast cancer awareness. Then came what O’Cain hoped would be the first of many races for breast cancer—a second-place finish in Larry's maiden race at Aqueduct and $820 in the bank for the cause.