Four Months After Four Olympic Gold Medals, Ohio State Legend Jesse Owens Raced a Horse in Havana for a Paycheck

Introduction: From Olympic Immortality to Racing a Horse

In August 1936, Jesse Owens became one of the most celebrated athletes on the planet, winning four gold medals at the Berlin Olympics and directly undercutting Adolf Hitler’s Aryan supremacy propaganda on Nazi Germany’s home soil. It remains one of the most iconic achievements in the history of sport. Yet just four months later, on December 26, 1936, the Ohio State legend was standing at a starting line in Havana, Cuba — not against another sprinter, but against a racehorse named Julio McCaw, running for a paycheck instead of a medal.

It’s one of the more jarring footnotes in American sports history: a four-time Olympic gold medalist, celebrated as a national hero, reduced within months to novelty exhibitions just to make ends meet. Here’s the full story of how it happened, and why.

Why Jesse Owens Needed the Money

The uncomfortable truth behind Owens’ post-Olympic career is that gold medals didn’t pay the bills. In the 1930s, Olympic athletes were strictly amateurs, and any hint of turning professional or accepting appearance fees could result in a ban from the sport. Owens skipped a series of post-Olympic exhibition meets in Europe that the Amateur Athletic Union expected him to compete in, and as a result, the AAU permanently banned him from amateur competition.

That decision effectively ended his competitive track career at just 24 years old — an age when most elite sprinters are entering their prime. With no professional track circuit to fall back on and few opportunities available to Black athletes in 1930s America, Owens was left with a difficult choice: find a way to monetize his fame, or watch it fade without ever benefiting from it. The AAU ban also derailed a planned sprint matchup against Cuban sprinter Conrado Rodrigues in Havana that December — the very event Owens had traveled to Cuba to compete in.

The Race in Havana

With the human opponent no longer an option, event organizers needed a replacement, and their solution was almost unbelievable by today’s standards: a Cuban horse named Julio McCaw would stand in for Rodrigues. On December 26, 1936, in front of a crowd at Tropical Park in Havana, Owens lined up at the starting blocks across from the racehorse, which was given a 40-yard head start over the 100-yard course.

Owens didn’t just compete — he dominated. He crossed the finish line in 9.9 seconds, beating the horse by roughly 20 yards despite giving up the head start advantage. The trick, as Owens revealed later in his career, was psychological as much as physical: high-strung thoroughbred horses tend to spook badly at the sound of a starter’s pistol, giving him a crucial head start of his own before the animal ever hit full stride. Over a short 100-yard distance, that was often enough to win outright before the horse could build up real speed.

For his trouble, Owens reportedly earned around $2,000 for the spectacle a substantial sum in the middle of the Great Depression, but a jarring price tag to put on the dignity of an Olympic champion.

Not a One-Time Stunt

As strange as the Havana race sounds, it wasn’t an isolated incident. It was, in many ways, the beginning of a new phase of Owens’ career that would stretch for roughly a decade, from late 1936 through at least the mid-1940s. Owens crisscrossed the country and beyond — racing horses in Cuba, Idaho, North Dakota, and wherever else promoters were willing to pay. He didn’t stop at horses, either. Over the years, he raced dogs, motorcycles, cars, and even took on baseball players and Harlem Globetrotters-style exhibition teams in the years that followed.

Owens was open about how uncomfortable the arrangement made him. He later admitted the races made him feel like “a freak,” and acknowledged the criticism that came his way for participating in what many viewed as a degrading spectacle for a man of his athletic stature. But Owens also had a family to support, and in an era with essentially no other avenue for a Black amateur athlete to cash in on Olympic success, the exhibitions were simply survival.

Owens’ Own Words on the Experience

Perhaps the most enduring quote from this chapter of Owens’ life is the blunt, matter-of-fact way he later explained his reasoning to critics who questioned why an Olympic champion would stoop to racing animals for money. Owens pointed out that four gold medals, however historic, couldn’t put food on the table or pay rent a stark reminder that athletic glory and financial security were, and often still are, two very different things.

It’s a sentiment that resonates even more sharply today, in an era where college and professional athletes can build significant wealth directly from their name, image, and likeness. In 1936, no such system existed. For Owens, four gold medals made him a legend but it took races against horses, dogs, and cars just to make ends meet.

Why This Story Still Matters

Owens’ post-Olympic exhibition career is often overshadowed by the historic nature of his performance in Berlin, but it’s an essential part of understanding the era he competed in — and the barriers Black athletes faced even after achieving the highest levels of success in their sport. The Havana horse race wasn’t a punchline; it was a snapshot of the limited, often humiliating options available to a Black American icon in the years before professional sports and endorsement deals opened up more dignified paths to financial stability.

Owens eventually moved on from the exhibition circuit in the late 1940s, transitioning into work as a public speaker and corporate spokesman, roles that finally allowed him to benefit more directly and more respectfully from the legacy he built in Berlin.

Final Thoughts

The image of Jesse Owens standing at a starting line across from a racehorse in Havana is one of the more surreal snapshots in American sports history, but it’s also a powerful reminder of just how little institutional support existed for even the greatest athletes of the era. Four months after becoming an Olympic immortal, Owens was still fighting for a paycheck a sobering contrast that makes his story all the more remarkable, both for what he achieved on the track in Berlin and for what he had to endure just to get by in the years that followed.