Gabriel “Spider” and Aisling Duignan with Echo Sound

An owner’s thrill winning a graded stakes is even greater when that horse is a home-bred. And if there’s a special bond between horse and owner, so much the better.

Gabriel “Spider” Duignan, who usually doesn’t keep the fillies and colts he breeds, knows that feeling. When Echo Sound, a daughter by Echo Town out of Eagle Sound by Fusaichi Pegasus, who was co-bred by Vision TBs and Bruce and Patricia Pieratt, captured the Gr.3 Miss Preakness Stakes at Pimlico May 16th, Duignan and his wife Aisling had completed a personal vow.

“What makes her special was her mother was very special to us and very good to us and a great producer,” Duignan said. “I think she was the first mare we bought together. She was getting older, and she hemorrhaged and died shortly after birth, a couple hours after giving birth. That’s never nice to watch, but it happens. That was her first filly. She’s a home-bred. From that standpoint, it makes her a little special. We vowed that we’d keep Echo Sound.”

They’ve never regretted that decision.

Echo Sound was born on the Duignan’s 300-acre Springhouse Farm near Lexington, not far from Ashford Stud, where Aisling works as the Director of Bloodstock. They own half of the 100 Thoroughbreds living there. The other half belongs to their clients.

The Duignans purchased Eagle Sound for $70,000. Before Echo Sound, she had produced eight winners. She was 19 when she foaled Echo Sound. 

Echo Sound has won five of her six starts and made over $450,000 under the care of trainer Rusty Arnold. Her last race was a 4 ¼ length romp at Saratoga in the G. 3 Victory Ride Stakes at Saratoga July 3rd. That was sweet for Arnold, who trained Victory Ride: “It’s a really good thing to run in a race named after one of your horses. Not many people get to do that. So it’s fun.” Duignan said simply, “Today was her best race.”

Echo Sound is the first horse Arnold has trained for Duignan: “I have known Spider for a long time through the sales and being around Keeneland. I hadn’t trained for Spider. About a year ago, when the filly went to Florida to be broken, he approached me and said, `Hey, I’ve got a filly we’re going to put in training and I’d like to give you this filly.’ I said, `I’d love to have her.’”

He’s been smiling ever since: “As owners, they’re the greatest. He said, `My deal is I send you the horse and you drive the car and just tell us how she’s doing and where we want to go and what you want to, and we’re on board.’ He said this was his mare’s last foal and he wanted to replace the mare with her.

“They’re horse people, he and his wife. They’re wonderful people.”

They have made a substantial impact in Thoroughbred racing ever since Duignan emigrated from Ireland to America with a plan he never followed four decades ago.

“I’ve been lucky. I’ve definitely been lucky,” Duignan said. “I was just one of those kids born with a love of horses. I started out with ponies. I realized I couldn’t make it as a rider.”

He took a job at Airlie Stud, succeeding a worker nicknamed Spider. When his boss at Airlie struggled to pronounce Duignan’s name, he gave him the same nickname. It’s stuck for the rest of his life.

At Airlie, Duignan met the veterinarian, John Hughes, who took a personal interest in him and arranged a job for him across the Atlantic: “John Hughes sent me to America to Bill O’Neill at Circle O Farm. I’ll be forever indebted to John Hughes. That was my first trip to America. At 21, you have a different view. You’re looking to explore. My plan was to do a year here in America and a year in Australia and then back home. But I loved Kentucky. I never went to Australia.”

In America, Duignan hooked up with another Irishman, Pat Costello, who had preceded him to America by six months. Costello also worked at Circle O and they became close friends and partners, originally participating in a partnership called The Lads. In 2001, they co-founded Paramount Sales. “Pat and I started Paramount Sales and that was great,” Duignan said. “We’ve never had any differences. I’ve always been lucky to have great partners.”

Duignan, who also hooked up with David Garvin at Ironwood Farm and Dr. Tony Lyons of Castleton Farm, credits both of them for his success.

In the spring of 2022, the Duignans were honored to return to Ireland to accept the Wild Geese Award from the Irish Thoroughbred Breeders’ Association, made to “compatriots who fly the tricolour in exemplary fashion on foreign fields.” Duignan said, “That was a nice award from my peers. It meant a lot to me.”

Horses still do: “I enjoy getting a good horse and selling a good horse. I still love the whole process.”   

Lael Stables with She Feels Pretty

Nineteen years removed from the triumph and tragedy of their Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro, Roy and Gretchen Jackson are still winning major stakes on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. Their outstanding turf filly She Feels Pretty won her fourth consecutive graded stakes, taking the G.1 New York Stakes at Saratoga June 6th. “We’re still kicking,” Jackson laughed. “At our age, 88, we’re sure enjoying it. We’re just lucky to have this horse.”

Their horses have been lucky to be owned by the Jacksons.

“I was a big fan of theirs since Barbaro,” She Feels Pretty’s trainer Cherie DeVaux said. “You see them go through the highs and lows and they handled that with such grace. It’s really special to have a relationship with them.”

There are few breeders and owners who have raced so many top horses in North America and Europe, including the unbelievable feat of Barbaro winning the Gr.1 Kentucky Derby and George Washington winning the Gp.1 2000 Guineas on the same afternoon, May 6th, 2006. “They’ve both been wonderful experiences,” Jackson said. “We’ve been pretty lucky in the whole situation. You don’t know if they’re going to stay healthy. It’s such a gamble. We just sort of plodded along through the years just trying to have some fun.”

They sure know how to plod along. She Feels Pretty has already given the Jacksons their 14th season with more than one million dollars in earnings and their 18th over $900,000. Their horses have won 495 races from 2,511 starts with earnings topping $32.4 million. And, of course, they were the Eclipse Award Outstanding Owners of 2006.

Being able to share this success together cannot be underemphasized. “It’s been great,” Jackson said. “She’s the one. She was involved at a young age riding.”

They grew up just 10 miles apart in Pennsylvania. Gretchen was a foxhunter, a pastime of Roy’s mother, who also dabbled in racehorses. 

Roy spent six years as a stockbroker before following his passion for baseball, owning a couple minor league teams and co-founding Convest, a management firm for professional athletes. He sold his share in the company to concentrate on horse racing.

By then, Lael Farm was up and running successfully. The Jacksons purchased the 190-acre property in Chester County, Pennsylvania, in 1978 and named it Lael, the Gaelic word for loyalty. 

They backed up their loyalty by taking care of all their horses when they were done racing. For years, Barbaro’s dam, 25-year-old La Ville Rouge, who earned more than $250,000 with six victories from 25 starts for Hall of Fame trainer Phil Johnson, shared her paddock with Superstar Leo, the first horse the Jacksons purchased in Europe, and $400,000-plus graded stakes winner Belle Cherie, also trained by Johnson.

In five consecutive starts, Superstar Leo won the Gp.3 Norfolk Stakes at Royal Ascot, a restricted race for sales graduates, finished second in the Gp.1 Phoenix, won the Gp.2 Flying Childers and finished second in the Gp.1 Prix de ’Abbaye de Longchamp. She finished her career with five victories and four seconds from 13 starts, earning $284,001.

From 15 foals, she produced 11 winners, including Enticing, a dual Gp.3 winner and the dam of three-time Gp.1 Prix de la Forest winner and $1.2 million earner One Master, who had seven victories from 23 starts.

After Superstar Leo died on Lael Farm at the age of 26 on June 26th, 2024, Jackson said, “We were very lucky to purchase her after my wife Gretchen happened to see her run. We brought her over from England after she was through having foals to live out her life at our place.”

That’s a destination Barbaro never reached.

Barbaro was brilliantly trained and managed by legendary equestrian Michael Matz, a six-time U.S. national champion who was given the honor of carrying the U.S. flag at the 1996 Olympics Closing Ceremony. Seven years earlier, on United Airlines Flight 232, he saved three siblings traveling alone and went back to rescue an 11-month-old girl after the plane crashed. One-hundred eighty four people survived the crash; 112 did not. The three siblings remained in touch with Matz and hooked up with him before he saddled undefeated Barbaro in the 2006 Kentucky Derby. In a domination seldom seen in the Run for the Roses, Barbaro won effortlessly by 6 ½ lengths under perfect handling by Edgar Prado. That made Barbaro six-for-six, three-for-three on both turf and dirt, with earnings topping $2.3 million. 

He didn’t survive the Preakness. After breaking open the starting gate and being reloaded, Barbaro suffered a catastrophic fractured right leg in the first eighth of a mile.

Over the next eight months, fans and non-fans followed his battle to survive under the care of Dr. Dean Richardson at the University of Pennsylvania’s New Bolton Center. After finally getting well enough to graze outside his barn, he suffered the crippling, painful hoof disease laminitis, the same disease that killed Secretariat in 1989. Barbaro was humanely euthanized. Gretchen said at a press conference. “Grief is the price we all pay for love.”

It’s nearly 20 years later. “Isn’t that unbelievable?” Roy Jackson said. “It was like a real roller coaster. Dean Richardson would call every morning. So many people followed the whole situation. We couldn’t believe the bins of cards we got from kids.”

Now, the Jacksons have another popular horse, She Feels Pretty, who has already won four Gr.1 stakes, missing two more by a half-length and three-quarters of a length. Overall, she’s seven-for-10 with one second and two thirds. “She’s amazing,” DeVaux said.

And she has a pal, a black and white goat that dutifully follows her around, even loading into a trailer. His name is Mickey. “Mickey has been to Woodbine, California, Keeneland and Saratoga,” Jackson said. “Mickey has done the job. Mickey’s really got to get some of the credit for the whole thing.”

Pin Oak Stud with Parchment Party

The late Ms. Josephine Abercrombie, a consummate horsewoman who founded Pin Oak Stud in 1952, left a tough act to follow when she passed peacefully in her home January 5th, 2022, just 10 days before her 96th birthday.

“Mrs. Abercrombie was an amazing lady and a great steward of the land, and most importantly, it was always the horse comes first,” said Clifford Barry, who’s been working at Pin Oak Stud for 35 years.

She would have smiled knowing that Dana and Jim Bernhard, who purchased Pin Oak Stud in November, 2022, and their son Ben, a rocket scientist turned horseman, have continued her good work, complementing their considerable success on the track with cutting-edge technology to prevent equine injuries, like the one that killed their first and best horse, Geaux Rocket Ride, as he was preparing for the 2023 Breeders’ Cup Classic. He was their first Thoroughbred, a birthday gift from Jim to Dana.

Simply put, the Bernhards, like Abercrombie, do the right thing. “That’s where it all starts,” Ben said. “Everything we do, we put the horse first, and my parents have driven that point home.” His mother said, “We are passionate about doing a good job for the horses. They can’t speak for themselves.”

Barry has witnessed the Bernhards’ ongoing commitment: “It’s been amazing to watch Jim and Dana be like-minded as Mrs. Abercrombie. I mean it really has been heartwarming to watch. Anytime you go through a major transition like this, you worry what the next entity will involve. But they’ve come in, and we got a facelift to the farm and added new property and new buildings and really have got the horses’ health and welfare at heart for sure.”

Abercrombie was an incredible owner and breeder. Among her nearly 100 stakes winners were her home-bred Eclipse Champions Laugh as well as Confessional, Peaks and Valleys and Broken Vow. She was The National Breeder of the Year, in 1995 and the winner of the Hardboot Award from the Kentucky Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association and the William T. Young Humanitarian Award. In 2018, Abercrombie was the Honor Guest of the Thoroughbred Club of America in appreciation for her “enduring sportsmanship, acumen and vision, and her devotion to the loftiest principles established by earlier leaders on the Turf.”

Like Abercrombie, Dana grew up with horses: “I grew up in Louisiana. I was given my first horse, a Tennessee Walker, when I was eight years old, and I’ve owned a horse ever since. I began riding that day. She was a trail horse for me. I was given my next horse for my 10th birthday, Dixie. I had her until I was 29. My love was horses, not just racehorses.” 

Dana worked as a corporate attorney and marketing director. She met Jim, the founder and partner of Bernhard Capital Partners, through work. Jim’s company, based in Baton Rouge, now manages about seven billion dollars buying and investing in companies, and has some 30,000 employees.

“I was a lawyer and our law firm handled Jim’s corporate law,” Dana said. “He was a client. When we decided to start dating, we had an office rule against dating co-workers. I said, `How about clients?’ The senior partner offered me a list. We got married some six months later.”

They married in 1993 and Jim became an avid horseman. Asked why he loved it, he said, “Because Dana loves it.” They have purchased and maintained a dozen Friesians, a breed originated in the north Netherlands which nearly went extinct more than once. They ride their horses at Pin Oak Stud in Kentucky and Pin Oak Stud South in Baton Rouge. “When we got our first Friesians some 13 years ago, there were less than 75 in the United States,” Dana said. “Their personality reminds me of our two labrapoodles. They are just big puppy dogs.”

  In June, 2021, Jim gave Dana a birthday gift, a trip to Lexington to buy a Thoroughbred yearling at the Fasig-Tipton July Sale. They wound up with three yearlings. The first one was Geaux Rocket Ride, a son of Candy Ride out of the Uncle Mo mare Beyond Grace. He cost $350,000 and was given to Hall of Fame trainer Richard Mandella.

Geaux Rocket Ride won a maiden race by 5 ¾ lengths, then finished second by 2 ½ lengths to Practical Move in the G.2 San Felipe Stakes. Another victory by  a length and three-quarters in the $100,000 Affirmed Stakes convinced his connections to up the ante. Sent off at 12-1 in the Grade 1 Haskell at Monmouth Park, Geaux Rocket Ride went head-to-head with the even-money favorite, Arabian Knight, put him away, then turned back a rally by Kentucky Derby winner Mage, winning by a length and three-quarters. In his final start before the Breeders’ Cup Classic at Santa Anita, Geaux Rocket Ride was second by a neck to Arabian Knight in the G.1 Pacific Classic. His three victories and two seconds in five starts had produced $980,200 in earnings. He was a legitimate contender for the Classic.

“In the Haskell, we were thrilled,” Dana said. “Rocket was such a feisty horse on one hand, feisty with his feed bucket, but in the barn and the paddock, he was so kind and loving. He loved his bath. He played with the water hose. He was quite a character. We just loved him. He was our first racehorse. We still love him to death.”

 One week before the Breeders’ Cup, with Dana and Jim watching his workout live on TV, Geaux Rocket Ride suffered a horrific injury in his front leg, which was described by Breeders’ Cup officials as “an open condylar fracture with intersesamoid ligament damage.”

Dana said, “We were at our home in Pebble Beach and about to fly down to LA. We watched him live.” Jim said, “We saw it live. We didn’t know the extent of it until we drove down there. We couldn’t save him. His leg was too far gone.”

He was euthanized the following Wednesday. “It was a typical roller coaster ride,” Mandella said. “We had the greatest time with him, but also had one of the worst days of my life.”

His respect for the Bernhards is immense: “It’s a wonderful family, I can’t say enough good things about them. They want to do everything right by the horse.”

Ben, who had spent a lot of time hanging out with Mandella at his barn, was deeply affected, so much that he decided to leave Space X in Los Angeles and become a vice president of Pin Oak Stud and start his new company of developing equine sensors, Stable Analytics, with technology similar to the ones he had used at Space X: “Geaux Rocket Ride was training at Santa Anita, and I used to hang out with Richard Mandella, probably the biggest reason I’m into horse racing. Learn from him. Watch Geaux Rocket Ride train. I just got so into it. I decided to make the move.”

Dana said, “It was a wonderful thing. He is very passionate about preventing this type of accident in the future.”

Jim said simply: “He’s smart.”

Ben said of his career change: “It’s a lot of things that are different obviously, but there are surprising similarities. I talked to my friends back at Space X. They said, `There’s nothing like the rush you get watching a rocket launch.’ I said, `There’s something similar, watching your horse win a race.

“I came into this trying to make it as much of a math problem as I can. I know math and engineering. I think there’s an opportunity to look at it from that perspective. Geaux Rocket Ride had the best horseman, the best jockey, the Breeders’ Cup veterinary staff and somehow he still gets injured. There’s got to be a way to detect things.”

Ben developed equine sensors, which all the 150 to 170 Thoroughbreds wear at Pin Oak Stud: “They’re practically air-space sensors which began in the aerospace industry. We see gait changes and data. I’ve never really been a horse person. Richard Mandella changed that.”

Mandella said of Ben, “I’m sure he makes his parents proud. He’s just a class person, a gentleman, and maybe genius-smart. Yet he’s just the most normal young guy you could ever meet, just a pleasure to be around.”

At the Keeneland 2022 September Yearling Sale, the Bernhards bought Parchment Party, a son of Constitution out of Life Well Lived by Tiznow bred by Bobby Flay for $450,000. Ben’s sensors caught a potential problem. “We found a small abscess that was growing,” Jim said. “We were able to take care of that long before it became a major problem.”

Parchment Party, who is trained by Hall of Famer Bill Mott, won his first two starts. On June 6th, 2025, at Saratoga, he captured the Belmont Gold Cup when it was switched from turf to dirt, by 8 ½ lengths. In doing so, he clinched a berth in the starting gate for the Melbourne Cup, the race that stops a nation. “He’s the first Kentucky-bred to make the Melbourne Cup,” Jim said. “Australia? It’s just a little island down south from here. It’ll be fun.”

Kentucky Oaks 2025 owners - Kristian Villante, Kyle Zorn, Travis Durr of Legion Racing with Drexel Hill

The three musketeers of Legion Racing, Kristian Villante, Kyle Zorn and Travis Durr, are on quite a tear. Last year, their Honor Marie finished second in the Louisiana Derby, then competed in the Kentucky Derby, the Belmont Stakes and the Travers Stakes, finishing eighth, fourth and eighth. This year, their filly Drexel Hill has them primed for the Kentucky Oaks off a victory in the $200,000 Busher Invitational at Aqueduct, March 1st. 

Considering they started Legion Bloodstock, their full-service bloodstock agency, only four years ago, it’s rather amazing.

“I think, truthfully, why we’ve been very successful is that we all see eye to eye,” Villante said. “There are no egos. Just one team. The people we have assembled all kind of share the same vision. We all see eye-to-eye. We’re all doing this because we love it. It’s just a belief in ourselves. Everyone’s able to feed off each other and build off each other. Myself, Travis and Kyle had been very good friends before we started Legion, so it’s like three brothers.”

Or three musketeers.

“It’s very easy,” Villante continued. “It’s fun to do every day. We’re always on the same page. We can kind of make our own little footprint and prove ourselves.”

 They chose another friend, a young trainer who just went out on his own, to lead them, and Whit Beckham has delivered, training both Honor Marie and Drexel Hill. Beckman worked for Todd Pletcher, Eoin Harty and Chad Brown before going on his own in 2022. “I think we had all this confidence knowing Whit,” 

Villante said. “He’s done a great job building in the last two years; the passion he has for it; the horsemanship second to none. He just has a way with all these horses. She (Drexel Hill) is a prime example of that.”

Beckman is enjoying working with his friends at Legion: “I’ve known Kristian and Kyle for the last 15 years. Me and Kyle actually grew up together in Louisville and went to the same high school. I worked with Kristian for Todd Pletcher, so we became pretty good friends back in the day. Travis, he’s been selling horses for so long and has a training center in South Carolina. So he really has a good feel for buying a young horse. Kyle is as sharp as the other two. Kristian always said, `If you go on your own, we’ll make sure you get a barn full of good horses.’ So they made good on their promise. We’ve had a lot of luck together. They’re all super sharp horseman.”

Durr has certainly made a huge difference in Beckman’s stable, sending him Simply Joking, a three-year-old filly who won two stakes and finished second in the Gr. 2 Fantasy Stakes, and three-year-old colt Flying Mohawk, who was second in the Gr. 3 Jeff Ruby. Neither are owned by Legion.

Durr’s interest in horses traces back to his grandfather and father, who both raced Quarter Horses: “We always had horses. We used to go to Texas, Delta Downs. I started riding at the bush tracks.”

At the age of 12, he rode races on bush tracks in Georgia and South and North Carolina. As his family transitioned to Thoroughbreds, Durr began breaking young horses for his father and grandfather. 

When his father died in 1995, Durr took over the family business. He began breaking horses in St. George, South Carolina, for local clients in 2007. He then joined the Webb Carroll Training Center in Matthews, South Carolina. In October, 2016, Durr and his wife Ashley then purchased the training center from Carroll.

“Time has flown by,” Durr said. “Me and Kristian have been buddies for a while, working with me with Webb. I started buying horses for the training center for myself. We’d look at horses together. We liked the same type of horses. We started the racing groups based on me and Kristian buying yearlings at Keeneland for $20,000 and it was tough.”

Now they spend more, but not a lot more. Honor Marie cost $40,000; Drexel Hill $50,000. “Me and Kristian talk four times a day,” Durr said. “We’re pretty good buddies. We all work together. It still doesn’t feel like a job a lot of days. We still get to enjoy what we do.”

Zorn also traces his love of racing back to his grandparents: “From the time I was ready to walk, two or three years old. I just loved it. Everybody had their favorite jockey: Patty Cooksey and Pat Day and Jerry Bailey. I still have signed goggles. The track was always a fun place to go.”

Zorn worked at a training center, then for trainer Pat Byrne, eventually becoming his assistant trainer. Then Zorn helped Maribeth Sandford, the owner of Take Charge Indy, when her husband passed away from cancer: “Maribeth was left with all the pieces. She needed help and I took a job helping her. That’s how I met Travis Durr. We became friends right away. And through Travis, I met Kristian. I was good friends with Whit. We’ve been very blessed.”

Villante grew up in Philadelphia: “I just kind of always loved horses in general, not necessarily horse racing. My dad [Joe] had a friend, Scott Lake.  I was 12 or 13. I went to Parx. They’re amazing animals to be around. Scott took me under his wing. Did I have any idea of what I was going to do this? No.”

He did after working for Todd Pletcher and meeting Beckman: “We had very similar personalities. We became friends and it kind of grew.”

Still. One for all and all for one.

Kentucky Oaks 2025 owners - Mike Gatsas (Gatsas Stables) - Five G

Family has always been paramount to Mike Gatsas, in his family business and his family’s passion in horse racing. “Family is super important to him,” his son, Matthew, said.

Now, their family’s home-New York-bred Five G, named to honor Gatsas’ five grandchildren, will be their first starter in the Gr. 1 Kentucky Oaks. The fact that Five G is a daughter of their star runner Vekoma makes it even sweeter.

Matthew is the Vice-President of Trivantus, a payroll service/employee benefits/human resource administration company his father founded in New Hampshire in 2003. He’s partnered with his brother-in-law Danny Casey.

Matthew named Vekoma, a son of Candy Ride out of Mona de Momma by Speightstown, a horse Gatsas partnered with Randy Hill: “We were trying a bunch of names. So many got rejected. Our family was going to Disney World for the first time. There’s a big roller coaster there named Vekoma, made by Expedition Everest. I just thought it was a cool name. His dad was Candy Ride. Everybody loved it.”

The fact that Vekoma turned into a multiple Gr. 1 stakes winner and now a superstar stallion didn’t hurt.   

Vekoma finished 12th in the 2019 Kentucky Derby, one of his rare losses. He won six of his seven other starts, including the Gr. 1 Carter Handicap and the Gr. 1 Metropolitan, and earned $1,245,525.

Then Vekoma became the leading 2024 first-crop sire, standing this year for $35,000 at Spendthrift Farm.

Mike Gatsas bred his Quality Road mare Triumphant to Vekoma and was rewarded with Five G, who followed a dismal debut – seventh by 22 lengths – with a victory and second on grass, a nine-length victory in the $150,000 Cash Run Stakes, a fine second to Quietside in the Gr. 3 Honeybee Handicap and a 2 ¼ length score in the Gr. 2 Gulfstream Park Oaks. “It’s great we get to share it as a family,” Matthew said.

That’s the way Gatsas intended it to be. Asked about his highlight participating in the 2019 Kentucky Derby, he replied, “Being there with my whole family, my wife, my kids, my grandchildren. That’s how we got started, having something the family could do.”

Well before he bought his first horse in 1998, Gatsas let his intention to buy a Thoroughbred known. “It was 100 years ago when I was a little kid,” Matthew said. “We had been at Lake George with another family. We were sitting at the dinner table. The story goes that somebody offered them a tip on a horse that was running. I was very young. We had to go to Saratoga. Dad said to one of his friends: `I want a horse that runs at Saratoga.’”

When he was a teenager, Matthew remembers trips to Rockingham Park, not far from their New Hampshire home: “We’d go every Friday, Saturday and Sunday. It seemed like we went all the time.”

In 1998, his father purchased two horses: a sleek, gray New York-bred gelding named Gander and Shadow Caster. Gander went on to be 2000 New York-bred Horse of the Year. He won 15 of his 60 starts, including six stakes, the biggest being the 2001 Gr. 2 Meadowlands Cup. He finished second in the 2000 Gr. 1 Jockey Club Gold Cup and his earnings of more than $1.8 million are still 13th all-time among New York-breds. Shadow Caster was no slouch, making nearly a half a million thanks to eight victories in 47 starts. Gatsas’ brother Ted, a former state senator and mayor of Manchester, was his partner. 

Asked about Gander, Gatsas said, “Being new to the game, my trainer, Charlie Assimakopuolos thought it was a great opportunity to get a New York-bred. I was sold on the program ever since. It’s a phenomenal program.”

Gander paved the way for future success. “Gander is the one who got us started,” Matthew said. “Probably, he’s the reason we’re still in the game. I don’t think a lot of people have that luck early on.”

Racing as Sovereign Stable, the Gatsas family had more luck with Negligee, a two-year-old filly who gave them their first Gr. 1 victory when she took the 2009 Alcibiades.

Fortuitous seating at Saratoga led Gatsas to partner up with Randy Hill, who races as R. A. Hill Stables, on Vekoma. Hill’s box was right behind Gatsas’: “We met, and I said, `what do you think if we split some horses?’ He said, `sure.’ We really got to like each other. We’re really having fun with these horses.”

Gatsas guesses he now owns 40 Thoroughbreds, many in partnership with Randy Hill and others. Gatsas uses trainers George Weaver, John Terranova, Danny Gargan and Ricky Dutrow.

“We don’t have a big stable, but we’ve been very blessed,” Gatsas said. “George has done a great job with this filly. I’m pleased to be associated with George and his wife Cindy. We’re very blessed to have George as a trainer.”

Matthew said, “We’ve been in the business a long time. I’m very much involved in it. I love the sport. There’s no doubt I got that from my dad. My wife Celia, she’s from the Saratoga area and she enjoys the races. Now my kids, Calla and Matthew, are picking it up from me.

“We all made it to Keeneland when Vekoma won the Blue Grass. Then we went on to Louisville. It was pretty awesome. The kids were too young to enjoy it, but they did come. I think all five of them (grandchildren) are super excited for this (the Kentucky Oaks). It’s going to be pretty cool.”

Triple Crown 2025 contender owners - Jim and Claire Bryce (Jim and Claire Limited) - Heart Of Honor trained by Jamie Osborne

This time last year British based trainer, Jamie Osborne, came up with the idea of putting together a group of dirt bred horses to campaign in Dubai this past winter.

Heart of Honor, a British bred son of Honor A.P. was one that made the trip. He has now run six times and never finished out of the first two including a placed effort in the Gp.3 UAE 2000 Guineas before finishing a heart wrenching nose behind Admire Daytona in the UAE Derby (Gp.2) on the first Saturday in April - thus earning himself a guaranteed spot in the Kentucky Derby starting gate.

On his return from Dubai, Osborne indicated that Heart of Honor would more than likely bypass the first Saturday in May at Churchill Downs and instead aim his colt for the last two legs of the Triple Crown.

If he does make the trip over, Heart of Honor will be a first runner in the US for owners Jim and Claire Bryce. The Bryce’s involvement in racing has grown exponentially over the last few years, since selling their software business. In addition to the horses they have in training with Jamie Osborne, they also own the famous Rhonehurst Stables in Lambourn, from where their jumps trainer, Warren Greatrex is based.

Jamie Osborne is no stranger to running horses in major international races having trained Toast Of New York to win the UAE Derby in 2014 before finishing his 3yo season with a near miss in the Breeders’ Cup Classic (Gr.1) at Santa Anita when finishing a nose behind Bayern.

Mark Davis and Craig Dado – Raging Torrent

Article by Bill Heller 

Talk about a power lunch. Five years ago, Mark Davis, owner, and president of an electric power company and a restaurant owner, had lunch with horse-obsessed 14-year-old Gillian Guerra, and instantly dived into horse racing, even though he’s allergic to horses.

         His partner Craig Dado, a long-time executive at Del Mar and Santa Anita before starting his own company, tells the story of the lunch which got Davis into racing: “I got a call from Gillian’s dad. He was a chef at Mark’s restaurant. Gillian worked there, too. He said, `I’ve got this daughter who’s horse crazy. She loves horse racing.’ He said, `What can I do?’ I said, "Okay, let me set something up.”

         Dado went to trainer Doug O’Neil’s barn and ran into Steve Rothblum, a former trainer who is now a bloodstock agent for O’Neil. Dado takes up the story “Steve and I are tight. I said, will you have lunch with this girl?” He does and another gentleman is there. It was Mark Davis. So the meeting goes well. All of a sudden, Mark pops in and said, `I want to buy a horse for her.’ They claimed a horse for Gillian. The point is Mark loved what Steve did for her and said, `I want to buy horses.’ Then he writes a big check. That’s where Raging Torrent came from. Mark is head over heels in horse racing. He’s buying a farm in Kentucky. Gillian is now a freshman at the University of Kentucky. He’s paying her way through college. He’s an amazing, generous person.”

       Asked about paying Gillian’s college costs, Davis described the concept of paying it forward, being nice to someone because someone was nice to him; “When I was 16, someone did something for me. She helped me with the horses five years ago. She’s a pretty special girl.”

         Gillian said, “I’m eternally grateful for him. He saw I had a passion for it.”

         Davis does, too. He didn’t let his allergy to horses stop him from having more than a dozen horses on his California farm, including three Clydesdales: “We got the first Clydesdale, Becky, when she was pregnant. The sire is a Quarter Horse. We might be starting a new breed.”

Davis named the nine-month-old foal Pegi for his company, the Precision Electric Group, Inc., with offices in Seattle and San Diego.

         Davis’s love of Clydesdale is immense: “They are gorgeous. They are so beautiful.”

         Thoroughbreds are too, and Davis has more of them than he ever imagined: “It got a lot bigger than I thought it was getting. We bought five horses at the Keeneland Sale, two with Jeanie Buss, one of the Lakers owners. Jeanie never owned a horse other than with her family.”

         Davis’s horses have taken him to Dubai, which is where he expects Raging Torrent to make a start, and possibly South Korea: “I’m still learning, because I’ve only been in racing for five years. I’m 71 years old. I don’t have to work very hard. I like doing all this stuff. It’s worth trying.”

         Raging Torrent is why. Purchased for $75,000 as a two-year-old, he upset likely Sprint Champion The Chosen Vron by a head in the Gr. 2 Pat O’Brien at Del Mar. After finishing seventh from the rail in the Gr. 1 Breeders’ Cup Sprint, he captured the Gr. 1 Malibu by a length and a quarter on opening day at Santa Anita, December 26th.

         The two victories were especially meaningful to Dado, who was an executive at Santa Anita and Del Mar for 30 years: “It was pretty surreal to be in the winner’s circle for both the Pat O’Brien and the Malibu. I’ve been there presenting the trophy.”

         Dado started working as an intern at Santa Anita in 1990 and worked his way up to executive roles there, from 1991-2000, and at Del Mar from 2001-2021.

         Along the way he started Great Friends Stable in 2007: “I was Chief Marketing Officer at Del Mar and I wanted to bring fans into the game as new owners. Let current fans into the game. It’s very different from My Racehorse. We only have 20 shares.”

        He left Del Mar in 2021 to start his own company in San Diego, Sports Injury Central: “Basically, it’s a media site helping gamblers and fantasy players with updated injury status and how it’s going to affect the outcome of games. My partner, David Chow, was the team doctor for the Chargers. We thought there was a void in the market, especially football. It’s very challenging but it’s a lot of fun watching the company grow. We had 750,000 people come to the website.”

         He called Raging Torrent’s victory in the Malibu “Amazing. I worked at Santa Anita for 10 years. Opening day was always the highlight.”

Al Gold (Gold Square LLC), Dr. Michael Lee and George Messina – Cyclone State

Article by Bill Heller 

Three men with ties to racing longer than four decades, Al Gold, the majority partner of Gold Square LLC, Dr. Michael Lee and George Messina, celebrated Cyclone State’s emphatic 3 ½ length victory in the $150,000 Jerome Stakes at Aqueduct, January 4th, his third straight victory in his stakes debut. “They’re great guys,” Cyclone State’s trainer Chad Summer said. “Michael brought his wife and three girls to the track. They had a great time in Times Square. He’s a guy who just loves the game. George has a trainer in his family. We’ve got a lot of people on this horse’s back. It’s been a great ride.”

       Cyclone State’s victory was the first graded stakes score for both Lee and Messina, who are related through marriage. Gold’s horses, however, have been in the national spotlight many times.

       Though he grew up near Monmouth Park in New Jersey, his first visit to a racetrack came in upstate New York. His family routinely spent vacations in the Catskills at the then-famous Grossinger’s Hotel in Liberty, N.Y. and at the Concord in nearby Monticello. When he was 16, he overheard men talking about a horse they liked racing that night at Monticello Raceway. Gold went to the track that night, cashed a bet and never looked back. “A lifetime of enjoyment for me,” Gold said. “That got me addicted to it. You just walked into the place, and it was electric, Monticello. Everybody looked so happy.”

        Later in his life, he frequented Monmouth Park: “I went 90 minutes before post time. I just loved it so much.”

        He made his career in the family business of real estate: “I never really liked it. I needed the money to get horses and go to the track.”

       He bought his first Thoroughbred in 2004. He named several of them uniquely: My Italian Rabbi, Meet the Mets, Geaux Mets, Full Court Felicia, Who Hoo That’s Me and Howard Wolowitz for a character in the TV comedy The Big Bang Theory.

       But he gave his best horse a serious name, Cyberknife, because that device helped him survive prostate cancer. He learned the bad news on December 7th, 2020, his 65th birthday. A cyberknife is a robotic radiation therapy device. Despite its name, a cyberknife is part of a noninvasive procedure which delivers radiation to cancer cells without damaging other healthy issues or cells. “There’s a more accurate name for it now,” Gold said. “Fortunately my doctor caught it earlier. Cancer hit me in three more spots, but I get a blood test every three months. A shot every six months. My last tests have been clear.”

       He hoped Cyberknife, a $400,000 purchase at the 2020 Fasig-Tipton Kentucky Selected Yearlings Showcase, would tell others that prostate cancer can be treated and is no longer a death sentence.

       Trained by Brad Cox, Cyberknife gave Gold his first Gr. 1 stakes victory in the 2022 Arkansas Derby; a start in the Kentucky Derby finishing far back, and another Gr. 1 win in the Haskell. He also finished second to Epicenter in the Gr. 1 Travers and second by a head to Horse of the Year Cody’s Wish in the Gr. 1 Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile. Cyberknife earned $2,137,520 with five victories, four seconds and one third in 13 career starts. Gold sold Cyberknife's breeding rights to Spendthrift Farm, and he entered stud in 2023.

       Asked about his best moment in racing, Gold said, “When my kids, Dayna and Bryan (now 37 and 34), are there with my wife Holly and they are smiling and happy, like when we did the walkover for the Derby.”

       Lee, his wife Jennifer, and their three children, Emma Claire, Annalise and Ellie, 20, 18 and 16, enjoyed visiting New York City and, of course, the victory in the Jerome. “Super exciting,” Lee, a 50-year-old ear, nose and throat doctor in Mobile, Alabama, said. “We watched the race from the rail in the winner’s circle. Cyclone State took over. It was exciting. The kids enjoyed the attention.”

         Lee’s grandfather, Willys Rhodes, was a trainer in South Mississippi: “He had a small track and a barn. I used to go out there and train horses that would ship into the Fair Grounds. My uncles helped train a few horses. I was probably around 10. It always starts with the love of animals. The people surrounding them are super entertaining. The whole atmosphere. It’s hard to understand if you’re not in it.”

        Lee and Messina have partnered on several horses: “George’s son, Trace, is an assistant for Brad Cox. I met Al through Steve Margolis. He trains for me in New Orleans. We met at the sales. Al and I both kind of hit off. Through Trace, I got to know Chad Summers. Al had some horses with Brad at the time. At Saratoga, we hung out with Chad and Al. At the Keeneland Sales, they approached us. We said Al doesn’t usually do partnerships, but we all knew each other.”

         Lee’s been smiling ever since: “We’re having a great time with this horse.”

        Messina has a catering service in New Orleans which started in 1961 and now does all the catering for the Fair Grounds.

        “My interest in horses started when my dad had a restaurant close to Jefferson Downs,” Lee said. “Fair Grounds horsemen stopped there. Owners, too. We put up pictures. My dad owned a couple of horses. My wife’s grandfather, Willys Rhodes, was a breeder, owner and trainer, all Louisiana-breds. In 1997, we put together a group, all family members, 18 of us. We bought a horse, Skyy Me Up.”

         Skyy Me Up won three of nine starts in 1997 and ’98. “We bought a couple more horses,” Messina said. “I stayed in the game.”

        He had more luck as a partner on T.B. Track Star, who captured the Gr. 3 1999 Lone Star Derby.

       He’s delighted that Lee is his partner: “Mike was part of Skky Me Up. Mike had a love for the horses just like I did. He did well with his medical practice. We decided to partner up. We were lucky that Al asked us to partner with him on Cyclone State. I’ve owned horses, but I’ve never been on the Derby Trail. It’s beyond my wildest imagination.”  

Rich Mendez (Morplay Racing), Sheila Rosenbloom (Lady Sheila Stables) and Joey Platts – Guns Loaded

Article by Bill Heller 

Only Thoroughbreds could bring together Rich Mendez, a music executive from Puerto Rico who believes he was conceived at Saratoga Race Course; Sheila Rosenblum, a ballet prodigy from Switzerland; and Joey Platts, a Wyoming cowboy and oil and gas industry executive. Guns Loaded did that when he captured the $145,000 Mucho Macho Man Stakes by a neck at Gulfstream Park January 4th.

         “We’ve been very blessed,” Mendez, who founded Morplay Racing with his son Josh and partners Randy Hartley and Dean DeRenzo, said. “It’s been an amazing ride so far, and it taught me a lot because you never know when that next one comes.”
        Mendez’s uncle, Victor Sanchez, was a jockey. “My uncle has been here at Gulfstream Park for 52 years,” Mendez said. “My mom used to walk horses at Saratoga with my dad. The story is I was conceived somewhere at Saratoga Race Course. I’m sure it was in a barn somewhere.”

        It didn’t take long for Mendez to fall in love with horses: “I’ve always loved horses. The smell of being around the barn. It intrigued me. I just always loved watching the big races on TV. You always saw the white-haired trainer, Bob Baffert. He was a rock star.”

         Mendez would work with rock stars in his career as a music executive at Rich Music, an independent record label he founded with his son Josh in 2007.

         After purchasing his first property in Ocala, he met Harley. Then DeRenzo. Harley and DeRenzo let Mendez into their pinhooking operation. They, in turn, joined Morplay Racing.

         At the September 2022 Keeneland Sales, Harley and DeRenzo landed an Iowa-bred colt named No More Time for $40,000. Racing as a two-year-old for trainer Jose D’Angelo, No More Time finished second in his maiden debut then won a maiden by 6 ¾ lengths.

         No More Time made his three-year-old debut in the Macho Mucho Man Stakes and finished fifth. He rebounded to win the Gr. 3 Sam F. Davis Stakes by a length and a quarter, Morplay’s first graded stakes victory, and then finished second by a neck to Domestic Product in the Gr. 3 Tampa Bay Derby.

         D’Angelo trains Guns Loaded, an $800,000 purchase at Keeneland. He too, finished second in his maiden debut and also won his maiden in second start. Stepping up to stakes company, he won the Macho Mucho Man.

         Mendez said, “I love the fact that he is winning. My trainer and I, we’ve got a unique relationship. My trainer has become a really good friend. We talk probably three or four times a day.”

         D’Angelo said, “I’m very happy to train for them. They have a lot of confidence in me. At the end of the day, you need good horses to be a good trainer.”

         Sheila Rosenblum’s Lady Sheila Stable employs three talented trainers, D’Angelo, Linda Rice and Brad Cox. Two of them have her horses on the early Derby trail, Guns Loaded, trained by D’Angelo, and the undefeated, four-for-four New York-bred Sacrosanct, who is trained by Cox. “It’s your reason to wake up early every single day,” Rosenblum said. “You have a dream: be there in May. It’s very rare to have two possibilities on the same path for the Derby. It would be so amazing to me.”

         She’s on an amazing run. Besides Sacrosanct, she and partners own the undefeated four-for-four New York-bred With the Angels, who is trained by Rice.

         Rosenblum had a whiff of the Derby trail nine years ago when Matt King Coal finished fourth by 2 ½ lengths in the 2016 Wood Memorial. He didn’t make the Kentucky Derby, but he earned $662,650 in his career from just 13 starts.

        Lady Sheila Stables top earner was La Verdad, the 2015 Eclipse Champion Female Sprinter who won 15 of 21 starts and earned $1,458,100. La Verdad died on May 10th, 2020, from complications with colic. Just six days earlier she had foaled a healthy colt by Into Mischief.

        Dancing, not horse ownership, seemed her destiny. Born in Basel, Switzerland, she spent years at the Royal Ballet School in London, then the School of American Ballet, the associate school of the New York City Ballet in New York City: “I went there as a ballet dancer when I was 14 and I stayed.”

         She would turn to modeling, working with the well-known agencies Wilhelmina and Ford, and then to horses: “My family didn’t like animals but I turned it into a way of life.”

         She founded the all-female Lady Sheila Stable more than 10 years ago: “That was a dream come true from my ex-husband. He wanted to buy a dressage horse for me. I had this wonderful idea to get a couple of Thoroughbred yearlings. And he did. And that’s how it started. It’s the most humbling sport and profession. It’s been lovely. I’ve met a group of wonderful people.”

        She is a board member of the March of Dimes, an advocate for children’s rights and is deeply committed to after-care for horses: “I’m very pro aftercare, especially New Vocations. We are all involved with them.”

       Now, she is officially on the Derby trail with two horses: “The Derby is my son Erik’s birthday. All I can do is pray.”

      She is realistic: “I don’t have the numbers others do. I have a handful. I’ve now spread my wings to breeding. It’s something I’m sticking to with a passion.”

     Joey Platts’ passions are horses and rodeos. Born in the small town of Lyman, Wyoming, Platts won a silver belt buckle in team roping. His wife Wendy was Miss Rodeo Wyoming in 1981. They keep rodeo horses on their 30-acre farm in southeastern Wyoming near the Utah border.

       Platts bought his first Thoroughbred from Becky Thomas of Sequel Stallions in the early ’80s, and they are still working together four decades later.

       Looking for a tax write-off for his heavy construction business, the Platts claimed Lusty Latin for $62,500 after he finished second by a nose at Hollywood Park on November 29th, 2001. The following year, after finishing third in both the Gr. 3 El Camino Real Derby and the Gr. 1 Santa Anita Stakes to Came Home, Lusty Latin took the Platts to the Kentucky Derby. Lusty Latin finished 15th, way behind War Emblem. Lusty Latin would go on to finish his career with six victories, six seconds and nine thirds in 50 starts, earning $439,729.

Robby Norman (Norman Stables LLC) - Coal Battle

Article by Bill Heller 

Fourteen years ago, Alabama grocery owner Robby Norman needed a new direction in his life: “I went through a divorce, something I really didn’t want. We actually had just bought a new home. I had two young sons. I went to stay in an apartment in downtown Thomasville by the railroad tracks. I was flipping through channels on TV. On TVG, they were doing a story about Union Rags (2012 Belmont Stakes winner). I said, ‘You know what? This divorce stuff is negative. I’ve got to do something to get out of this.’ I watched that story.”

         Then he went on the internet and learned all he wanted about Thoroughbred racing: “There’s a lot of stuff you can google.”

         He found a partner and bought a Louisiana-bred. “It became a passion,” Norman said. “I guess we just thoroughly enjoy horse racing. Me and my ex-wife get along very well now. I named an Arkansas-bred for my ex-wife. We focus on the regional market: Oklahoma-bred, Texas-bred, Louisiana-bred.”

         His star Louisiana-bred Secret Faith had a tremendous year in 2024 with six victories and a second by a head in seven starts for trainer Jayde Geiner. Racing against state-breds, she won five stakes by margins of three-quarters of a length, 14, 6 ¼, six and 7 ¼ on December 29th. Purchased for $75,000, she has already earned $367,022.

         But she’s not the stable star. Norman’s Kentucky-bred. Coal Battle, purchased for $70,000, upped his dirt record to four-for-four by taking the $250,000 Smarty Jones at Oaklawn Park, virtually wire-to-wire by four lengths January 4th for trainer Lonnie Briley, who posted his first million-dollar year in 2024 ($1,055,476), his 34th year of training.

         Norman recounted their connection: “My brother Mark, who also bought a few horses, was doing some googling and noticed a training center in Opelousas, Louisiana. The person who owned the training center recommended Lonnie. We wanted somebody who was honest. I have two trainers, Jayde and Lonnie, and I could not ask for better trainers. They let us get involved. It’s made it a very fun family business.“

         And he knows all about family business. He majored in accounting at Troy University, and his first job was at a grocery warehouse. Then he made a dream come true for his father. “My dad had brain surgery when he was 21. He passed away at 52. His dream was to be in the grocery business. Mark and I just went and did it. He was alive when we had the first store.”

         One store, Norman Food in Thomasville, Alabama, has grown into eight and includes ones in Mississippi, Florida and Georgia.

         When Norman wants to get away from groceries, he turns to racing. “What horse racing does is vacations. We go to Lone Star Park or we race in Houston and go down to Galveston. We like to go to the Ocala Breeders Sales and we stop at the beach. We know all the best steak houses. We’re simple people, but we thoroughly enjoy it. You’ve got to take the good with the bad. It is a roller coaster of emotions.”

         Briley is deeply appreciative of Norman’s perspective: “He’s a great guy, a good person. If you run 1-2-3 in a race, he’s happy. He loves the game. He likes to go to the sales. He’s a friend, more than an owner.”

         Norman and Briley saw the Smarty Jones Stakes as the first important step in Arkansas to get on the Kentucky Derby trail. Norman said, “I slept good the night before the race, but the night before that, I didn’t hardly sleep at all. I just tossed and turned all night. My son Drew and I drove over eight hours to Oaklawn. I think he relaxed me. My step-son Logan was there too. My other son Nathan missed it. He stayed home. We were all excited about Coal Battle. I thought he looked good in the race. Reading the pace was very important. Juan (jockey Juan Vargas) did an excellent job.”

         Briley was very surprised Coal Battle vied for the early lead: “Normally, we take him back. Vargas just couldn’t hold him. The fractions were slow. In the stretch, Vargas told me he just grabbed the bit and he was gone.”

         In a post-race TV interview, Briley said early in the race he thought, “I’m going to kill that jockey.” Of course, he was much more appreciative of the rider, who’s ridden Coal Battle in five of his six starts, afterwards. Then he spoke of Coal Battle: “He’s a gutsy little horse. Don’t know if it’s sunk in yet. No. It’s crazy for the little guy, you know.”

         A lot of people are rooting for the little guy’s horse. In his previous start, Coal Battle had won the $100,000 Springfield Mile at Remington Park. At the end of the Smarty Jones Stakes, the announcer called him “The pride of Remington Park.”

         Coal Battle certainly gets around. He’s also raced at Evangeline Downs, Kentucky Downs, Keeneland and Delta Downs. “He’s easy to train,” Briley said. “He’s easy to be around. He’s run on slop, turf, muddy and fast tracks. The horse will run anywhere.”

         At Churchill Downs on the first Saturday of May?

        Of course, the phone started ringing after the Smarty Jones Stakes. “We have got calls about selling him,” Norman said. “Lonnie gets more calls than me. I got one last night. We’re going to let things calm down. As of right now, the decision is not to sell.”

Graded Stakes Winning Owners - Marsha Naify with Gold Phoenix

Words Bill Heller

Seeking a third consecutive victory in the Gr. 2 Del Mar Handicap August 31st, Gold Phoenix seemed hopelessly trapped on the inside in mid-stretch under Kyle Frey.  “It was a little scary,” said Marsha Naify, who owns the six-year-old gelding with Little Red Feather and Sterling Stable. “He’s in there and staying on the rail. I’m saying, `Oh, my god, what is going to happen?’ Then he goes through. He had enough gas in the tank. It was perfect. And we made history. Three in a row had never been done.”

Marsha knows about California racing history; she’s been part of it. She was the first woman to serve as chairman of the Thoroughbreds Owners of California and she used that position to launch CARMA, TOC’s Santa Anita-based retirement program, in 2007.

“When I was at TOC, I wanted to get some retirement program going in California. Richard Shapiro and our executive director Drew Couto helped. We looked at the Ferdinand Fee (a voluntary retirement fee supported by the New York Racing Association, the New York Thoroughbred Horsemen’s Association and the New York Thoroughbred Breeders), and we looked at the numbers in California. We came up with an outline that it would be so much per horse just for the owners. And it would be an opt-out program.”

It wasn’t a smooth ride getting it approved by the TOC and the California Horse Racing Board. “There were a couple of arguments,” Naify said. “One was that some owners do take care of their horses. The other argument was we would never get it passed. It was not an easy thing. Eventually, the TOC Board did approve, and CHRB approved. Thanks to Richard Shapiro and other people, it passed. It was my idea to call it CARMA. The rest is history. It’s been really successful.” 

“Marsha has done a lot for CARMA and California racing,” said Tom Clark, who manages her Rancho San Miguel, where she keeps her California-based broodmares. “She loves to race. She’s carrying on the tradition of her family. Her father owned horses back in the ‘80s and ‘90s - she followed in his footsteps. Martha will do anything she can to keep horses safe and sound as long as they can live healthily. She’ll do whatever she can, I have a ton of respect for her. We need about a thousand like her. She’s the best owner in the world.”

Asked if she knew her father would be very proud of her accomplishments, she laughed and said, “That’s true. He loved the horses, we love our horses.”

Her equine love affair began at summer camp when she rode for the first time. “I grew up in San Francisco, and went to all the tracks. When my dad retired, he started acquiring horses. It was a perfect segue - he loved the horses, he loved going to the races. He researched, he grew his stable and had a lot of famous horses like Bertrando and Manistique. The list is extensive. Whatever he tackled, he was very good at.”

Her father, Marshall, was president of UATC (United Artists Theater Circuit). “It’s the largest in the United States.  UATC started as a small company in San Francisco with my grandfather. My dad was president. He wasn’t your typical businessman, he had a real artistic sense about him. He would hang out in a coffee house, Enrico’s. He loved to just sit there and talk to people. He was a very caring, loving man. That came through in everything he did. He had a big heart.”

Naify worked for her family’s business while dabbling in real estate. 

When her father died in 2000 at the age of 80, Naify and her sister, Christina, decided to sell most, but not all, of his horses at auction: “We decided to buy a couple horses back, which we did. We raced them and acquired a few more horses. Christina’s husband was a trainer in France. In the early 2000s, he recommended we buy a couple of horses in France, which we did. Then my sister dropped out of it and I kept on.”

She currently has 20 horses with Phil D’Amato, who trains Gold Phoenix, Leonard Powell, Neil Drysdale and Karen Headley. She also owns 15 broodmares she keeps at Gainesway in Kentucky, where she also owns stallion shares. “I breed in Kentucky, that’s been very successful.”

Her list of successful runners, many owned in a myriad of partnerships, includes million-dollar Gr. 1 winner Surf Cat and multiple Gr. 1 winner Street Boss, who earned $831,800.

Golden Phoenix, who is 8-for-22 with earnings topping $1.5 million, may be Naify’s best. He captured the 2023 Gr.1 Francis E. Kilroe Stakes by a neck, which also was his winning margin in this year’s Del Mar Handicap.

“They spotted this horse in Ireland,” Naify said. “The horse looked good on paper. From the get-go, the horse showed tremendous ability, but his races were sometimes uneven. He has performed extremely well. He loves the Del Mar track.”

So does his owner. “My favorite meet is Del Mar,” Naify said. “I have a vacation home there. It’s 15 minutes to get to the barns. I love hanging out with the horses.”

Naify, who lives the rest of the year in Long Beach, said, “Going to the Breeders’ Cup is one of the things I really love.”

She would love it even more if Gold Phoenix can improve in his third Breeders’ Cup appearance. In the 2022 Gr.1 Breeders’ Cup Turf at Keeneland, Gold Phoenix was a wide 10th at 41-1. In last year’s Breeders’ Cup Turf at Santa Anita, Gold Phoenix finished fast to gain fourth at 51-1.

Maybe the third time’s the charm.

Graded Stakes Winning Owners - Sean Flanagan with Chancer McPatrick

Words Bill Heller

The Gr. 1 Hopeful Stakes at Saratoga September 2nd, must have felt like a Twilight Zone episode to Sean Flanagan. He’d been the underbidder on the $1.3 million favorite, Ferocious, and owned the second betting favorite, Chancer McPatrick, a colt he bought for $725,000 a month after missing out on Ferocious.

Both two-year-olds had won their maiden debuts impressively.

This is heady stuff for Flanagan, who fell in love with the sport on family trips to Rockingham Park and Suffolk Downs, and then fell in love with Saratoga after watching Riva Ridge and Secretariat win back-to-back editions of the Hopeful Stakes at Saratoga in 1971 and 1972. He and Karen were married at the Big Red Springs on July 27th, 1991.

But Sean didn’t become a Thoroughbred owner until eight years ago. “I know how to bet an exacta, but having an eye for horses?” Flanagan said. “I’m getting better, but I’m still a novice.”

The novice now has one of the early favorites for the Gr.1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, and, dare we say, the Kentucky Derby.

Born in Lowell, Massachusetts, Flanagan’s family moved to Andover, Mass., when he was 14. “My father was a probation officer; my mother was a teacher,” Flanagan said. “She became the deputy superintendent of schools.”

He played a lot of hockey and baseball and enjoyed horse racing: “My folks used to go to Rockingham Park. I was four or five. I remember many Labor Days at Rockingham with five races in the morning, lunch, then nine more in the afternoon. It was just a great place. You could have a catch and play football. We went to Suffolk Downs and saw the Mass Cap.”

One of his first trips to Saratoga was to see the 1971 Hopeful, captured by Riva Ridge. The following year, he witnessed Secretariat’s incredible Hopeful performance when he rallied on the far outside around the entire field to win drawing away: “I saw Secretariat. My favorite for all time.”

While at Saratoga, the Flanagan family would stay in various motels: “We came up to Lake George, went to Fort McHenry. A lot of fun.”

Flanagan attended Brown University and lived in the Boston area. In 1996, he started a business, Cybergrants, a software company helping non-profit organizations streamline proposals for grants. “We worked with not-profit organizations. I ran it for about 20 years, sold it in 2015, but I held on to a percentage. I stayed on the board of directors for five, six years.”

The company has since been renamed Bonterra.

With enough revenue to explore Thoroughbred ownership, He and his friend, Phil Keon, bought into some racing partnerships eight years ago. 

“I remember taking my daughter, Grace, and her friends into the paddock at Saratoga,” Flanagan said. “She wanted to pet our horse. I said, 'wait until back at the barn.’ I had to explain I had partners, and she said, `Since when do you ever have partners?’”

Point taken: “I said, 'well, maybe I should try going alone.’ It’s not easy. I started out with John Kimmel. You have to put faith into good people. Kimmel is one of them.”

Kimmel, also a bloodstock advisor, was Flanagan’s first trainer. Flanagan moved on to Saffie Joseph and then Chad Brown, but Kimmel, as well as bloodstock consultant Nick Sallutso, have remained on Flanagan’s team buying new horses.

Flanagan and Brown had success with Top Conor, a million-dollar yearling purchase. He won his maiden debut by two lengths, then finished sixth in the Gr.1 Blue Grass Stakes and fifth in the Gr.2 Pat Day Mile. “He was training super in the beginning of May up at Saratoga, but he came up lame one day,” Flanagan said. “He had a hairline fracture. So we took care of that. He’s rehabbing in Kentucky.”

By then, Flanagan had nearly bought Ferocious, a son of Flatter out of Napier by Midnight Lute: “John (Kimmel) said this was the best horse in the sale (OBS, March). It was an interesting auction because I was sitting with John. He said, 'go to 6, 7 hundred thousand.’ Every time I bid; the other bidder answered right away.”

Flanagan’s final bid was $1.25 million. “I didn’t want to get caught speeding,” Flanagan said. He didn’t bid again. A partnership of JR Ranch, Ramiro Restrepo’s Marquee Bloodstock, trainer/co-owner Gustavo Delgado Jr.’s OGMA Investments, and High Step Racing got the colt for $1.3 million.

A month later at OBS, April, Flanagan bought Chancer McPatrick, a son of McKenzie out of the Bernardini mare Bernadreamy.

On July 27th, Chancer McPatrick made his debut for Chad Brown. Under Flavien Prat as the 2-1 favorite, McPatrick broke 10th, survived traffic jams and rallied seven-wide to win by a length.

One week later, Ferocious turned in a scintillating debut maiden victory, winning by 7 ¾ lengths. “I texted Chad that evening and told him I was the underbidder,” Flanagan said. “He said maybe if I did buy him, I would not have bought Chancer.”

Chancer McPatrick and Ferocious hooked up in the Hopeful. “If I could get a Grade 1 win at Saratoga, just from being a fan as much as I am, it would be the Hopeful,” Flanagan said. “In the early ‘70s, if you won, you were one of the favorites to win the Derby. To me, the Hopeful is my special race. It’s the race I remember the most, even more so than the Travers.”

The Hopeful began like a nightmare for Flanagan. Another poor start when Chancer McPatrick hit the starting gate coming out, then got hit by another horse. “Flavien said that night he got hammered in the gate, and one of his feet got out of the iron,” Flanagan said. “Then he got clobbered and we’re last again.”

Ferocious stalked the early pace, tried to take over at the top of the stretch, but seemed to idle. Chancer McPatrick, meanwhile, was once again hitting his late stride on the far outside. But when Ferocious saw Chancer McPatrick, he surged to go with him. “I thought that horse was done,” Flanagan said. “He eyeballed my horse and he picked up again. Turns out it was a tremendous race to beat that horse.”

Chancer McPatrick won by a half-length.

Let the dreams begin. Flanagan said, “What happens if this horse gets a clean trip? I’m looking forward to that.”

He did get a clean trip in the Grade 1 Champagne at Aqueduct October 5th, and he won by 2 ¾ lengths. On to the Breeders’ Cup.

Graded Stakes Winning Owners - Karl Glassman with Arthur's Ride

Words - Bill Heller

What’s in a name? For Karl Glassman, who named his Gr.1 Whitney Stakes winner Arthur’s Ride, everything. “The horse is named after my dad,” Glassman said after the race. “He passed a year and a half ago and he knew before he passed away that I named the horse after him. And he said, ‘You didn’t have to do that.’ I said, `Dad, I really did. You had a great ride.’ And he looked at me and said, ‘I have.’ He was 91 and had a great life.”

         So has his son, an incredible business success who has become a champion in the fight against pancreatic cancer.

Glassman is the President and CEO of Leggett & Platt, a 141-year-old Midwest-based global manufacturer of bedding products, furniture, flooring, and textile products. With 135 production facilities in 17 countries, Leggett & Platt generates some $5 billion in annual revenue. Glassman joined the company in 1982 as a sales representative.

“My grandparents made springs, and I’ve slept on springs all my life,” he told Sheila Long O’Mara in her May 17th 2023 story in Furniture Today.

Growing up in Southern California, Glassman’s mother’s family owned De Lamar Bed Spring Corp, in Los Angeles. Glassman began working on the factory floor following his high school graduation, and later became the company’s production manager as he worked his way through college at California State University in Long Beach, where he earned his degree in business management and finance.

Leggett & Platt purchased the De Lamar Bed Spring Corp. in 1979, and Glassman joined the company three years later.

In 2009, a bedding industry executive urged Glassman to attend a major fundraiser for pancreatic cancer in Phoenix. Glassman was so moved, he immediately signed on. Glassman’s mom had died of breast cancer at the age of 54. “Funding for medical research is the driving force in pursuit of early detection, extending patient quality of life and ultimately finding a cure,” Glassman told Debra Gelbart in a November 2019 story on the SEENA Magnowitz Foundation website.

Leggett & Platt Inc. has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars for pancreatic cancer research, and Glassman and his wife Cathi have personally donated substantially to the cause through the Seena Magowitz Foundation and the National Human Genome Research Institute in Phoenix.

Following Glassman’s direction, other mattress companies have joined the fight. “There aren’t a lot of industries where competitors come together over a common cause,” Glassman told Gelbart. “You can change the world one person at a time through this effort. We have a responsibility to try to leave the world better than it was before we got there. There’s no better way to leave a positive, lasting impact on the world.”

That’s a message Glassman and his wife have passed on to their three adult children, Ian, Nathan and Raychel, and their nine grandchildren.

         He’s also passed on the wisdom and achievements of his father. “He was so poor when he was little,” Glassman told Tom Pedulla of America’s Best Racing in his story on September 16th. “He spent the first 2 ½ years of his life being raised in a chicken coop in Nebraska. That’s how tough the Depression was.”

         Cathi described her father-in-law as a “great man, a very quiet, very humble, very kind man.”

         The Glassmans have been part of racing partnerships since 1995. They formed Glassman Racing nine years ago and now have 28 horses in training, half of them with partners. They also own five broodmares.

         They purchased Arthur’s Ride for $250,000 at the Keeneland’s September Yearling Sale in 2021 and gave him to Hall of Fame trainer Billy Mott. Freshened after finishing second in his first two starts as a two-year-old, Arthur’s Ride won his three-year-old debut at Gulfstream Park by one length.

         Then came the bad phone call. Arthur’s Ride had injured his tendon, and Mott gave him plenty of time to recover. Off for 13 months, Arthur’s Ride returned to win an allowance race at Gulfstream Park, finished fifth in an allowance and then dominated in another allowance race at Saratoga, winning by 12 ¾ lengths.

         It was impressive enough for Mott to enter his lightly-raced gray colt in the Whitney, one of the few Grade 1 stakes he hasn’t won. Beautifully ridden by Junior Alvarado, Arthur’s Ride made the lead and never had an anxious moment, winning by 2 ¼ lengths, giving the Glassman's their first Grade 1 victory. “The horse is named for my father and to share that with my siblings to watch it, and my dad watching from above, it doesn’t get better than that,” Glassman said. “To be part of Bill Mott winning his first Whitney – my goodness, we’ll wake up, but I don’t know when. I almost hope we don’t.”

         Unfortunately, they did. Arthur’s Ride finished fifth in the Gr.1 Jockey Club Gold Cup, but is heading for the Breeders’ Cup Classic. With his early speed, he should have a chance.

         After the Whitney, Glassman credited the people who made it possible: “Donato Lanni picked the horse; Dr. Barry Eisaman and his team in Ocala broke the horse. He had a little bit of a tendon issue and Barry got him back sound again. And Bill and his team are the best in the business. Bill gave him time. Bill Mott is as patient as they get. He’s the kind of horse that’s in perfect hands with Bill.”

         No matter what happens in the Breeders’ Cup, Glassman will enjoy the experience.

         “I’m not a particularly emotional person, but I will tell you that when he runs, it takes my breath away,” Glassman told Pedulla. “When he comes down the stretch, I always look to the sky.”

Graded Stakes Winning Owners - Atlantic Six Racing, owners of Book'em Danno

Whether you’ve been passionately involved in racing for decades, or was recently lured into the game by your brother, winning a Grade 1 stakes at Saratoga is as good as it gets. Book'em Danno gave six guys from Jersey, who race as Atlantic Six Racing, LLC, that thrill, taking the Woody Stephens Stakes on June 8th. “It was incredible; you had to pinch yourself,” Jay Briscione, the group’s managing partner, said.

Briscione, a 70-year-old real estate appraiser, began hotwalking at Monmouth Park in high school, then left college (Fairfield University) for one semester to be a groom at Hialeah. “I was in the same barn as Seattle Slew in his three-year-old season,” Briscione said proudly. “I watched him get ready for the Triple Crown. I had never been around horses at all. Being young, it was a pretty cool thing. Once it’s in your blood, it’s in your blood.”

His partner Mark Rubenstein, whose family business was doing municipal revaluations in Jersey, knows that feeling: “I dropped out of law school (Antioch Law School in Washington, D.C.) to work at the racetrack. It was the best time of my life: seven days a week at Hialeah. I was rubbing and grooming three horses. I just loved being around the Thoroughbreds.”

Both Briscione and Rubenstein worked their way up at the racetrack before resuming a more stable livelihood. “As I got older, there were no vacations,” Briscione said. “If I had gotten tied up with somebody at the high-end of racing, I might have stayed. I went back to school and got into real estate soon after college.”

But his feelings for racing never left him completely. “Always, I stayed interested,” Briscione said. “We tried to buy a horse with two friends. It didn’t work out. I owned a couple bad horses. But I always went to the races in the summer and to the big races, the Preakness, the Belmont and the Breeders’ Cup.”

Rubenstein put together small partnerships with relatives, racing as Red Flag Stable in the ‘80s: “We claimed a mare, Cuca’s Lady, for $25,000, at Monmouth in the late ‘80s. She went on to win seven stakes for us.”

Cuca’s Lady became a turf sprinter. She broke the track record at Monmouth Park for five furlongs, and in her next start she set the track record at The Meadowlands for the same distance. Later, she won eight straight races. She finished her career with 24 victories from 70 starts with 10 seconds, 11 thirds and earnings topping $350,000. “She was our big horse back then,” Rubenstein said.

By then, Briscione had put together Atlantic Eight Stable “Jim Ryerson was our trainer and a friend,” Briscione said. “The third horse we owned, Relaunch Lass, won her debut by 6 ½ lengths on a sloppy track at Monmouth.”

She won an allowance race in her next start at Philadelphia Park and retired with 11 victories, eight seconds and 16 thirds in 80 starts, making $179,673.

“Then we bred her,” Rubenstein said. “She died in foal to Mining. The foal died, too. That was our only attempt at breeding.”

Atlantic Eight lasted until the mid-‘2000s, In 2019, Briscione started Atlantic Six LLC, which included two partners from Atlantic Eight, Jim Scappi, who does equipment leasing, and real estate broker Frank Camassa. Camassa brought along his close friend Jeff Reshnikoff, an attorney. “Jim and I have been friends for 30 years,” Briscione said. “Frank was a hotwalker in Jersey before becoming a real estate agent. Jeff had owned horses before.”

Briscione called up Rubenstein. “I asked him, how about doing it again?” Briscione said. 

Rubenstein said, “Jay and I, we’ve known each other for years. He contacted me five years ago when he was reestablishing a racing partnership. He asked me if I was interested. I was out of the business. I said, `Sure.’”

Then Rubenstein called his younger brother, Jim, a semi-retired radiation oncologist in Fort Myers, Florida, who had never been in the business. “He didn’t know a hock from a toothpick,” Rubenstein said.

He didn’t mention that when he dialed his brother. “He was up front,” Jim said. “He’s done it before. He said, `You’re not going to make a fortune.’ Then he pulled out the grandchildren card. They can visit the horses in Monmouth, and in Tampa, where we’re near. I have 12 grandchildren. So I’m in.”

Good decision.

Atlantic Six’s first good horse was Counterfeitcurency (sic), a hard-hitting Jersey-bred who earned $199,152. “He was just retired,” Briscione said, “He’s going to be a show horse in Florida. He gave us the money to parlay into Book'em Danno. When we buy these, we’re basically looking for a Counterfeitcurency and maybe run in Jersey stakes. That’s a home run for us. When we got Book'em Danno, we knew we might have something.”

They bought the son of Bucherro out of the Ghostzapper mare Adorabelle privately from his breeders, Greg Kilka and Christine Connelly of Bright View Farm and gelded him before he started training.

Mark Rubenstein named the yearling: “I’m a child of the ‘60s, and Hawaii Five-O was one of my favorite TV shows. In quite a few episodes, they got the bad guy and they said, `Book'em Danno.’ I have no idea how that popped into my mind.”

Book'em Danno’s trainer, Derek Ryan isn’t known for cranking up his first-time starters. That made Book'em Danno’s debut even more impressive: a 9 ½ length victory in a Jersey-bred maiden race at Monmouth. He followed that with a two-length victory in the Smoke Glacken Stakes and a 6 ½ length romp in the Futurity at Aqueduct. He finished his juvenile season by finishing second by three-quarters of a length in the one-mile Nashua Stakes there.

Displaying no intention of sending his three-year-old on the road to the Triple Crown, Ryan picked the seven-furlong Pasco Stakes for his first start this year at Tampa Bay, and he won by 12 ½ lengths as the 1-5 favorite.

His next start would be in the one-mile $1.5 million Grade 3 Saudi Derby. “It’s shocking to believe that this horse took us to Saudi Arabia,” Briscione said. “Derek had brought this up in September. He had been approached by them.”

All Book'em Danno did was finish second by a head to unbeaten Forever Young. When Forever Young then finished third by a head in the Grade 1 Kentucky Derby, Book'em Danno was flattered. Then Book'em Danno won the seven-furlong $500,000 Woody Stephens Stakes by a half-length at Saratoga June 8th. “Amazing,” Jim Rubenstein said. “I was there.”

That made Book'em Danno five-for-seven with a pair of close seconds. He’s earned $835,625.

“To be in the business for such a short time, I know people put a lot of money into this, put a lot of time into this,” Jim Rubenstein said. “You almost feel unworthy.” 

Graded Stakes Winning Owners - Judy Hicks with Thorpedo Anna

Judy Hicks, who is forever linked to her incredible home-bred three-year-old filly Thorpedo Anna, overpaid for another filly 35 years ago: $10. That filly, Phoenix Sunshine, posted nine wins, nine seconds and three thirds in 47 starts, earning more than a quarter of a million. She was even better off the track, foaling six winners including half-a-million dollar-earner Boss Ego. Hicks calls Phoenix Sunshine “the anchor of my broodmare band.”

Learning from her Phoenix Sunshine purchase, Hicks only paid $6 for the foal of a mare whom the original owner kept eight years later. The foal was Miss Pink Diva, who was one-for-14 and made $111,780. She was second by a head in the 2016 Grade 3 Locust Grove Stakes, but in her next start, the Grade 1 Spinster Stakes, she broke down and had to be euthanized.

Both purchases came from an unpaying owner for boarding his horses at Hicks’ farm. “I’m stubborn,” Hicks said. “I’m a California girl. I didn’t know male chauvinism existed until I moved to Kentucky and that women weren’t allowed to speak. When I had somebody not pay their bill, I said, `This isn’t going to happen, so what do I have to do?’”

Hicks began researching state law and found out that if you give a client a month to pay and if you don’t hear from them, you have a legal right to have a sheriff’s sale, which is then advertised. “Nobody goes to them,” Hicks said. “There were two horses. The colt, I just let him go. But the filly I really liked.”

She liked her even more as the years went by.

Now Hicks owns Thorpedo Anna, five-for-six with one second and earnings of more than $1.7 million in her career. If there was an eclipse vote in mid-2024, she’d be a walk-over three-year-old filly champion and a contender for the Horse of the Year.

But Thorpedo Anna would never have been born if Hicks didn’t save her dam, Sataves, when common sense and logic suggested to give up on her.

Hicks has never believed in giving up.

Born in Chicago, Hicks’ family moved to California when she was six. “We had a little farm,” Hicks said. “We started having horses and go-karts.”

She chose horse racing over a career in NASCAR.

She spent five years finishing a double major of biological and animal sciences at California Poly. She wanted to go to vet school at UC-Davis, but didn’t get in. 

Through her grandfather’s connections – he knew the president of Texas A & M - she got into vet school there. She didn’t stick. “I was in vet school for six months, cleaning lab cages,” she said. “They had this Great Dane puppy in one of the experimental cages.” When she didn’t see him in his cage one morning, she asked, “Where’s Duke?’” She was told Duke’s remains were in several jars. “They had killed him,” she said.

That killed her desire to be a veterinarian.

Through another of her grandfather’s connections Hicks journeyed to Kentucky and was an intern at Forest Retreat Farm. While she was there, she met Dr. Donald Applegate and Cecil Horne. They were looking for a farm manager at their Mint Springs Farm. That’s where she met her husband, R.W.

In 1983, they purchased 600-acre Brookstown Farm in Versailles. It needed a lot of work, which has never stopped Hicks from doing anything she wanted. They began boarding Thoroughbreds, then began breeding and racing them. 

Sataves, a daughter of Uncle Mo out of the unraced Stormy Atlantic mare Pacific Sky, was born extremely premature.

“She was born six weeks premature,” Hicks said. “She was 40 inches tall. I didn’t weigh her, but she was maybe 60 pounds. A few weeks later, her owner came and saw her. Her hocks were crushed. The owner gave her to me. I said, `Let me see if I can keep her alive.’ I named her for Sataves, a Buddhist god.”

Hicks waited three years until conceding to the reality that Sataves was never going to race. “Because of her hocks,” Hicks said. “I bred her to Tourist.”

That foal, Charlee O, won two of 18 starts and earned more than $100,000 for Hicks and R.W.

They bred her back to Fast Anna, a Grade 1-placed sprinting son of Medaglia d’ Oro. Fast Anna’s crop that year was his last. He died of laminitis at the age of 10.

Thorpedo Anna was born on January 27th, 2021. “She was tough,” Hicks said. “She had a mind of her own. She was not an easy foal to raise.”

Trainer Kenny McPeek bought her for $40,000 at the 2022 Fasig-Tipton Kentucky Fall Yearling Sale.       

“I didn’t know Kenny,” Hicks said. “I went over and introduced myself. I asked him for 45 percent. All he did was laugh.”

Regardless, she maintained an undisclosed percentage of Thorpedo Anna, joining partners Brookdale Racing, Mark Edwards and Magdalena Racing’s Sheri McPeek, Kenny’s wife.

“I wasn’t familiar with Judy,” McPeek said. “She approached me after I signed the ticket. It worked out.”

Thorpedo Anna’s first race was at Keeneland. “Kenny couldn’t be there,” Hicks said. “He said, `you better go because she’s going to win by a lot.’”

She did, by 8 ½ lengths. She then won an allowance race by nine lengths and finished second by 5 ¼ lengths in the Grade 2 Golden Rod in her final start at two at Churchill Downs.

This year, no filly has been close to her. She won the Grade 2 Fantasy Stakes at Oaklawn Park by four lengths. She captured the Grade 1 Kentucky Oaks by 4 ¾ lengths, the first half of McPeek’s incredible weekend. The next day, McPeek’s Mystik Dan won the Grade 1 Kentucky Derby by a nose.

Asked about the Oaks, Hicks said, “I don’t think I expected her to win, but when she started drawing away, I went crazy. I was hugging Kenny. It was amazing. People said, `You don’t realize what you’ve done. The ultimate dream if you own a mare is winning the Oaks.’”

How about winning the Grade 1 Acorn Stakes at Saratoga, too? Despite losing a shoe during the race, she triumphed by 5 ½ lengths. Her next planned start is the Grade 1 Coaching Club American Oaks at Saratoga July 20th. 

“We have yet to ask her to run,” Hicks said. “I think she’s going to go down as one of the greatest fillies in history.”

Graded Stakes Winning Owners - Steve and Debbie Weston (Parkland Thoroughbreds) with Porta Fortuna

Steve and Debbie Weston will never forget the phone call from their daughter, February 14th, 2018, telling them the horrible news of the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. Seventeen people, including 14 students, had been killed. Fourteen more had been injured.

The Westons, who were at their second home in Saratoga Springs, live in Parkland. They met on blind date at a pizzeria in Parkland. They had named their stable Parkland Thoroughbreds three years earlier.

”You always think it happens somewhere else,” Debbie said.

Steve said, “We were on Route 9 going down to a car dealer. We couldn’t believe it. By the time we got to the car dealer. It was all over the TV.”

Six years later, they still struggle to understand. “Parkland is a great place,” Steve said. “We have very little commercial development, only a handful of stores. It was rated as one of the safest cities of America.”

Are there any safe cities in America now? “It’s happening all over America,” Steve said.

Debbie said, “I don’t think anyone in America hasn’t been touched by gun violence. I think the most important thing is to have people remember Parkland for something other than the shooting.”

The success of their modest-sized stable has people talking about Parkland Thoroughbreds.

Last year, their two-year-old filly Jody’s Pride, who is co-owned by Sportsmen Stable, won the Matron Stakes and finished second by a neck to unbeaten Just FYI in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Filly at Santa Anita. At three, she won the $200,000 Busher Stakes before finishing off the board in the Grade 1 Ashland at Keeneland. She was freshened and is back at Saratoga training for her return.

Less than an hour after Jody’s Pride finished second in last year’s Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Filly, Parkland Thoroughbreds and Medallion Racing’s turf star Porta Fortuna finished second by a half-length to Hard to Justify in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Filly Turf. Earlier last year, she captured the Group 3 Albany Stakes by one length in a field of 17 at Royal Ascot, then won the Group 1 Cheveley Park Stakes at Newmarket. Donnacha O’Brien, the son of Aidan O’Brien, trains Porta Fortuna.

In her 2024 debut, Porta Fortuna finished second in the Group 1 One Thousand Guineas at Newmarket. 

Her second race this year was at Royal Ascot, where she benefitted from a fine ride by Tom Marquand and won the Group 1 Commonwealth Cup by one length, becoming a rare repeat winner at the world-famous meet. “It was incredible,” Weston said.

His day got even better moments after the race: “We were on stage and told the King was coming. He came up and shook our hands. And then I was talking with the King for three to five minutes. He was very cordial, really nice. It was amazing, just amazing. There must have been a hundred cameras. It was a dream. So much more than winning a horse race.” 

Steve Weston, now 78, could never have dreamed of such success when he got hooked by harness racing decades earlier. “I’ve been going to the track in Detroit since 15,” he said. “Also Hazel Park and Northville Downs. All three are gone. I loved the racetrack. I wasn’t old enough to get in. I had to wait for the last four races when they opened the door.”

After graduating from high school, he and three friends teamed up to buy a $10,000 claimer, Our Stewart. “We won our first race with Our Stewart at Wolverine. It’s always exciting. It doesn’t matter if you have a put of $1,700. It never matters. Even today, if you have a claimer or you’re in a stakes race, when they’re coming down the stretch, it’s the thrill of victory. It doesn’t matter what the purse is.”

Yet he did say this: “One day I want to buy a Thoroughbred.”

Born in Brooklyn, Weston moved to Detroit, then to Parkland in 1989. He partnered with Bob Edwards and Joe Anzalone. After Weston bought Thoroughbreds, Edwards and Anzalone did, too. Edwards races as e5 Racing Thoroughbreds and Anzalone as Magic Cap Stables. e5 Racing campaigned two-year-old champion Good Magic, the sire of this year’s Derby top contender Dornoch.

Debbie Weston also has roots in New York. She was born in Syracuse, then lived in Albany. “My grandfather, every summer, went to Saratoga,” she said. “I never knew what it was.”

Now she can’t get enough of horses. Their home in Saratoga Springs abuts the Oklahoma Training Track. “The horses are practically in our backyard,” she said. “It’s a blessing to be there. I fell in love with the horses once I petted one of their faces. Racing is such a small part. The joy is to watch them train, feed them and hang out with them.”

She didn’t begin hanging out with Steve until they met on that blind date. “I was working as a hospital nurse, Steve was a sweetheart. He kept pursuing me. I gave him another chance and I’m glad I did. Steve was widowed several years earlier.”

The Westons began Thoroughbred racing in 2015 and have entered a myriad of partnerships. At last count, there were 50 of them in just 10 years.

They chose Parkland Thoroughbreds as their stable name because of the many horse farms in the area.

Then tragedy forever changed Parkland.

“Fortunately, we didn’t have any children attending, but we knew other people who did,” Steve said. My niece was an instructor and one of her kids was involved. I can’t begin to describe it. It’s a very small community.” 

  The Westons wanted to do anything they could to ease people’s pain, so they named their gelding - Parkland Strong, a son of Goldencents out of Inceptive by Empire Maker.

In a better world, Parkland Strong would have won the Triple Crown, or the Kentucky Derby or at least one of his nine starts. Trained by Abreu’s brother Fernando, Parkland Strong did post one second and four thirds, earning $28,850. “He lives with a person who breaks a lot of our yearlings in Ocala,” Steve said. “He has a good life.”

Better horses have followed, but none as good as Porta Fortuna and Jody’s Pride. Steve still doesn’t believe he actually won a stakes race at Ascot two years in a row. “Oh, it was incredible,” he said. “The way British people treated us; we were treated like royalty. Just being there was fantastic.”

Graded Stakes Winning Owners - Emily Bushnell and Ric Waldman (Resilience)

Talk about a tough act to follow. In their first venture together as Thoroughbred owners, Emily Bushnell and Ric Waldman have a Kentucky Derby contender, Resilience, who captured the Grade 2 Wood Memorial at Aqueduct on April 6th by 2 ¼ lengths.

Emily’s parents, Marty and Pamela Wygod, bred Resilience, a son of Into Mischief out of Meadowsweet by Smart Strike. “It means everything,” Bushnell said. “The love of the sport, just hoping you have one horse this special. It’s really, really exciting.”

Waldman, a Louisville native, said two days after the Wood, “It’s starting to sink in now. To have an ownership with Emily, a long-time client and friend, it is very emotional. It’s the first racehorse I’ve owned in many years.”

Bushnell was born for this: “I started riding basically before I could walk. My dad had horses when I was growing up. My dad started in the 1960s. He was a hotwalker. He grew up really close to Belmont. It’s been part of my family before I’ve been around.”

Sadly Marty Wygod passed away six days after the Wood victory. Wygod, who was born on February 1st, 1940, in Elmont, New York. He went to high school with Bobby Frankel and was a business administration graduate from New York University. In 1964, he was hired by Roy Nutt and Fletcher Jones for their stock brokerage firm, Computer Sciences Corporation. The following year, Jones, who owned Westerly Stud Farms near Santa Ynez, California, gave Wygod two Thoroughbreds as a 25th birthday gift.

In 1977, Wygod switched careers to the healthcare industry, purchasing Glasrock Medical Services. Five years later, he sold it for a huge profit. He then established Medco Containment Services, Inc., and built it into the largest mail order pharmacy in the country. In 1993, he sold Medco to Merck & Co. for more than $6 billion.

Wygod bought 240-acre River Edge Farm in the Santa Ynez Valley. In 1995, the Wygods moved to Rancho Santa Fe, California.

His slew of top Thoroughbreds includes Exotic Wood, Tranquility Lake, Sweet Caroline, After Market and Life Is Sweet. Wygod is a member of the Jockey Club, a trustee of the Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association and a member of the Del Mar Board of Directors. Wygod oversees two Breeders’ Cup Charities, the Rose Foundation and the WebMD Health Foundation.

Wygod’s River Edge Farm stood top California stallions, including Benchmark, Bertrando and Pirate’s Bounty. 

Bushnell carved her own niche in Thoroughbred racing. She is the Executive Director, a Therapeutic riding instructor and a mentor of Endeavor Therapeutic, now in its 10th year in Bedford, in Westchester County, New York. Its programs are for veterans, at-risk youth, incarcerates women and children and adults with disabilities. They serve 125 people a week. “Horses have been so important in my life,” Bushnell said. “I wanted to do something with them to help people. Also, horses need jobs.”

She is making a difference.

“She is a lovely woman,” Waldman said. “The whole family is lovely. I’ve worked for Marty and Pam for more than 25 years.”

Waldman, a native of Louisville, has been around Thoroughbred legends, including Storm Cat, Deputy Minister, The Minstrel and Northern Dancer, most of his life. He began his career at Fasig-Tipton Company in 1973 and advanced to general manager in 1981. He was the business manager at Airdrie Stud from 1981 to 1984. He was consultant and syndicate manager of Overbrook Farm from 1986 through 2009 and the vice president of operations and syndicate manager for Windfields Farm from 1987 through 2008.

In 1994, he established Ric Waldman Thoroughbred Consulting, Inc. When Overbrook and Windfields ceased operations, Waldman focused on two long-term clients, Marty Wygod and Samantha Siegel of JayEmEss Stables. He’s been working with them for more than 25 years.  

His association with Overbrook’s William T. Young, led him to manage the immortal stallion Storm Cat. But Storm Cat struggled initially. “I started managing Storm Cat in his third year and we sort of limped through his third and fourth year,” Waldman said in a 2013 Blood-Horse story by Evan Hammonds.

Working with a star and owning one are different endeavors. 

Resilience is the culmination of 18 years of planning, purchasing and breeding. The Wygods purchased Tranquility Lake, a daughter of Rahy out of the multiple graded-stakes placed dam Winter’s Love, for $250,000 at the 1996 Keeneland July Sale of Selected Yearlings. She is a half-brother to 1983 Belmont Stakes winner Caveat. Russell Drake, the late River Edge Farm Manager, selected Tranquility Lake.

All she did was win more than $1.6 million, taking the 1999 Breeders’ Cup Handicap at Hollywood Park and the 2000 Yellow Ribbon Stakes at Santa Anita.

She was bred to Storm Cat five times, and her first foal was After Market, a multiple graded stakes winning turf star. Her second foal was Jalil, who was sold to Godolphin for $9.7 million and won a Group 2 stakes. Tranquility Lake also produced multiple graded-stakes winner Courageous Cat. Hall of Fame trainer Bill Mott, who trains Resilience, trained Courageous Cat.

After producing seven foals, all male, Tranquility Lake was bred to Smart Strike and foaled her first filly, Meadowsweet, the dam of Resilience.

Through their breedings with Storm Cat, the Wygods got to know Waldman. “All the horses we’ve done together, talking with him and my parents on the breeding, working together for quite a while … owning this colt together and being on this journey, Ric and I are on the same page,” Bushnell said. “This is our first one, our first horse together. It was an opportunity for all of us to work together, have a good time together.”

She never imagined how good their first horse would be. But it took a bit of time.

Resilience finished sixth, second and third before winning a maiden race by 4 ¼ lengths. On a sloppy track in the Grade 2 Risen Star, Resilience contested the pace and held on well for fourth.

Mott decided to add blinkers for Resilience’s next start in the Wood Memorial. He relaxed well behind the pacesetters, then pounced on them, winning impressively and sending Waldman and Bushnell onto the Kentucky Derby for the first time. 

Graded Stakes Winning Owners - Dennis Albaugh, Albaugh Family Stable (Catching Freedom)

Before he could afford to buy Thoroughbreds, Dennis Albaugh had to succeed in business.

And though the start of his one-truck company out of his garage in Ankeny, Iowa, in 1979 was an utter disaster that nearly wiped him out, Albaugh preserved and now owns the ninth largest agricultural chemical company in the world, selling in 44 countries and manufacturing in nine.  

Though he grew up on a farm with a couple of riding horses, he was intrigued with agriculture: “I was always intrigued that you can spray crops with chemicals to protect them.” After two-years of college, he worked for a chemical company for three years. When the company asked him to relocate his family to Birmingham, Alabama, he declined. “I started my own company,” he said. 

That wasn’t easy. “I had to convince my wife to take a second mortgage on the house,” he said. She agreed. “She trusted in me, I guess,” Albaugh said.

The second mortgage allowed Albaugh to receive a $10,000 loan from the Small Business Administration. “It was very tough, I was very new in the business. It was a start-up company.”

 He purchased an old oil tanker, bought weed-killing chemicals from a company in Des Moines and delivered them to a company in South Dakota on his very first run. “It was a 200-mile run,” Albaugh said. “On the way up, I thought this truck was running smoother and smoother.”

He reached his destination. “I put the hose in the receiving tank,” he said. “Nothing was coming out. I opened the lid. It was empty. I said, `Oh, boy, I just spent $8,000 of my $10,000.’ It was very scary.”

The seals on his truck had failed, and he had dumped his entire load on the trip. “I called the Department of Agriculture and told them I dripped chemicals, but nothing toxic,” Albaugh said. “They said, `Thanks for killing all our weeds.’”

Telling the Department of Agriculture was easier than telling his wife what had happened. She asked him, “How did your first delivery go?”

He told her. She didn’t blink.

Undeterred, Albaugh got a couple days' leeway from his buyer in South Dakota. He quickly bought a new truck and made the same delivery.

And then he grew his company. In 1993, he bought his company’s biggest competitor. “We really soared after that,” he said. “I don’t know the word `no.’”

His incredible success in business mirrored his ongoing success with Thoroughbreds, which also had humble beginnings after his son-in-law Jason Loutsch, who is now Albaugh Family Stables Racing Manager, nudged him into the business. Last year, the stable had three runners in the Kentucky Derby including the favorite, Angel of Empire, who finished a fast-closing third. This year, Catching Freedom has them returning to Louisville on the first Saturday of May.

Loutsch still can’t believe it: “Growing up, my best friend had a horse farm two miles from Prairie Meadows,” Loutsch said. “We made believe we were jockeys.”

Loutsch bought a horse, Mr. Mingo, in 2003, and shared the experience with Albaugh. Mr. Mingo finished second in a $59,000 Iowa-bred stakes in his second start for his new owners. “Dennis said, `This is a lot of fun. Let’s get more horses,’” Loutsch said.

They did, buying a half-share of a two-year-old Trippi filly for $42,000 at the Ocala Two-Year-Olds in Training Sale in June, 2005. They named the filly Miss Macy Sue for Albaugh’s granddaughter, and gave her to trainer Kelly Von Hemel.

“She took us all over the country,” says Loutsch, “Then she turned into one of the best broodmares in the country. It really got our juices flowing.”
Albaugh said, “It was unbelievable. We went around the country and she kept doing well.”

Their talented filly won 11 of her 25 starts, including the Grade 3 Winning Colors Stakes at Churchill Downs and five other stakes. She had five seconds and three thirds, including a third in the 2007 Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Sprint at Monmouth Park. She earned $880,915.

But she wasn’t done making money. She produced Liam’s Map, who had six wins and two seconds in eight starts, earning $1,358.940,  Matera, a four-for-10 winner who earned $309,040 and Taylor S, who went three-for-seven and made $121,518.

Tired of not racing her talented progeny, Albaugh bred her to Giant’s Causeway and named her colt Not This Time. After finishing fifth in his debut, he won a maiden race by 10 lengths, the Grade 3 Iroquois Stakes by 6 ¾ and finished second by a neck to Classic Empire in the 2016 Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile.

He’d already made $454,183, but he didn’t race again. He’d hurt a tendon in the Breeders’ Cup race, making his performance even more impressive. Retired to stud, Not This Time finished 2023 as the eighth leading stallion with $13,223,548 in progeny earnings. He stands this year at Taylor Made Stallions for $150,000. “He pays a lot of bills,” Albaugh said.

 Along the way, Albaugh and Loutsch began an earnest pursuit of racing’s greatest prize, the Kentucky Derby. In 2016, their Brody’s Cause finished seventh. The next year, J. Boys Echo was 15th. In 2018, Free Drop Billy finished 16th. Dale Romans trained all three horses.

Last year, Angel of Empire, trained by Brad Cox, was third and Cox-trained Jace’s Road, owned in partnership with West Point Thoroughbreds, was 17th. Albaugh Family Stable and Castleton Lyons-owned Cyclone Mischief was 18th.

Catching Freedom, who is trained by Cox, has them dreaming again. “This is the 150th Derby,” Loutsch said. “We know how hard it is. It’s extremely hard to win. There are so many things that have to go right. There are so many factors going into it. This horse definitely wants to go a mile and a quarter. Hopefully, we’re fortunate enough to get a good trip.”

Albaugh said, “Just to get to the Kentucky Derby was a big honor. Having three horses last year was unheard of. We checked the history. We think that’s the record. We’re very thrilled to get back this year.”

Family is an integral part of Albaugh’s life. Loutsch and Albaugh’s daughter Tiffany have two girls, Julianah, 24, and Milan, 18. “They’re in charge of social media,” Loutsch said. “They go to all the races.”

Asked how hard it is to work for his father-in-law, Loutsch said, “Not hard at all. He’s truly one of the best guys in the world. He makes life real easy. No ego. Most importantly, he is fair and honest. He’s invested a lot in the game. We have a lot of fun together.”

Albaugh said, “My son-in-law got my interest going, it’s a whole family. It’s a lot of fun to go with all your family, it’s a lot of fun to get together.”

Especially if it’s in the winner’s circle on the first Saturday in May.

Graded Stakes Winning Owners - Eric and Sharon Waller (Stronghold)

Though Eric Waller was 10 years old when he accompanied his father to Santa Anita, he never really felt connected to Thoroughbreds.

His success with Barranca Insurance, which opened in Rancho Cucamonga in 1972 and is now run by his daughters, allowed him to purchase a couple of horses.

“Not Thoroughbreds,” Waller said. “One was a Paint, and one was a Quarter Horse. I wanted horses to ride. I thought that might be fun. It was at that time I realized I did feel something special about horses. I didn’t realize that was inside of me until I bought those horses. I found inner calmness and appreciation for the animal.”

That would be tested after he bought and began breeding Thoroughbreds. His early struggles and then continuing success on the track was tempered by horrible happenings trying to develop a broodmare band. But the Wallers never gave up and they now have a home-bred Kentucky Derby contender, Stronghold, a horse they can proudly point out traces back to four generations of their own Thoroughbreds.

Despite two of their stars dying while giving birth. Despite two mares who savaged their own foals.

Asked how he got through the rough parts, Waller said, “I wish I could tell you. I’m not a quitter. I believe someday, somehow, I’m going to get me a Grade 1 winner. I feel that was my goal. I hadn’t achieved it, so I couldn’t quit.”

Stronghold, who won the Grade 3 Sunland Derby by 2 ¼ lengths in an impressive three-year-old debut, added the Santa Anita Derby April 6th in his final prep for the Kentucky Derby. He is already the Wallers’ highest earner. Stronghold’s dam, Spectator, is second and Stronghold’s third dam, Swiss Diva, is third.

The Wallers’ entrance into Thoroughbred racing was disappointing. “My wife knew a retired jockey,” Waller said. “He had an old mare. She was in foal to a stallion named Lucky Sack. I went ahead and took the mare. I didn’t know anything about racing. I had that foal and decided to race that foal. That was about 1995. Of course, I didn’t have any success. I said, `I’m going to try a different route.’ There was a sale in California, Barretts. There was a mare in there by the name of One Stop. She was by Mr. Leader, in the family of Distorted Humor.”

One Stop is the fourth dam of Stronghold.

One Stop won just one of 19 starts and made $34,985. Waller bred her to Swiss Yodeler. The resulting filly, Swiss Diva, is the third dam of Stronghold.

Swiss Diva won her first three starts, including a $138,000 stakes for California-breds, by 8 ½ lengths, then finished fifth by 4 ½ lengths to superstar Rags to Riches in the Grade 1 Las Virgenes. Swiss Diva finished her 14-race career with four victories, three seconds and earnings of $240,399.

Put into perspective, the Wallers had won just seven of 76 starts from 2002 through 2013.

Envisioning a foundation broodmare, Waller bred Swiss Diva to Henny Hughes. Swiss Diva died foaling Diva’s Tribute. Though unraced, Diva’s Tribute is Stronghold’s second dam. 

Bred to Jimmy Creek, Diva’s Tribute delivered Spectator. She won three of her first four starts, including the Grade 2 Sorrento Stakes at Del Mar and was second to Midnight Bisou in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Oaks. Spectator retired with three victories, one second and one third from nine starts with earnings of $323,951.

“Spectator died giving birth to her foal,” Waller said. “A punctured colon. I was just sick. There are just so many lows in this business. There’s nothing lower than losing a horse.”

But the foal who survived was Stronghold. “Stronghold grew up on a nurse mare, just as his mother did,” Waller said.

“The people at Mulholland (Mulholland Springs Farm, where Stronghold spent his early days) told me this horse was a man among boys, a very classy looking individual that shows a lot of quality,” Waller said. “I took that seriously because these people are commercial breeders. They see hundreds of yearlings.”

In April of his two-year-old second, Stronghold was sent to California-based trainer Phil D’Amato, who had a string of horses in Kentucky. “Stronghold cast himself in the stall,” Waller said. “We wound up missing several weeks of training. Then, finally, things returned to normal.”

Stronghold finished second and first in a pair of maiden races at Ellis Park and Churchill Downs, then finished second in the Grade 2 Bob Hope Stakes to undefeated Nysos at Del Mar. He was second again by a half-length to Wynstock in the Grade 2 Los Alamitos Futurity.

Stronghold’s handy victory in his three-year-old debut in the Grade 3 Sunland Derby sent him soaring up the list of Kentucky Derby contenders. His sensational :58 2/5 work should have him moving forward as he tackles tougher opponents.

If all this is exciting, Stronghold doesn’t seem to notice. “He’s so quiet in the paddock, Phil thinks he’s sleeping,” Waller said. “He doesn’t turn a hair.”

Gamely bulling his way through horses, Stronghold won the Santa Anita Derby by a neck, giving Waller his ultimate goal, the one he stuck to despite all the heartache. “The Santa Anita Derby was our first Grade 1,” Waller said. “That’s why I’m in the business. It’s not about the money anymore, it’s about the achievement.”

And his determination. Achievement can’t happen if you give up.

Graded Stakes Winning Owners - Master Piece & O'Connor - Michael & Jules Iavarone

Article by Bill Heller

Is success more enjoyable the second time around? Michael Iavarone is finding out, on the racetrack, where he has reunited with trainer Rick Dutrow, Jr., and off.

Dutrow is making his own return following a 10-year suspension for drug violations. 

Off the track, Iavarone has rebuilt his own business after being nearly wiped out. “It took me a couple of years,” he said. “I built a bigger business than what I had.”

Iavarone’s love of horseracing traces back to growing up in Bethpage, Long Island, when he and his father fell in love with racing at Roosevelt, then the best harness track in the country with weekend crowds in the 20,000’s. “I loved it so much,” Iavarone said. “I remember it vividly. We’d eat in the Cloud Casino.”

In 1985, Iavarone and his father attended the second Breeders’ Cup at Aqueduct Racetrack, where he saw flawless victories by two incredible turf starts, Pebbles in the Turf and Cozzene in the Mile. “I was 15, and that just hooked me. Pebbles and Cozzene. It was something that always resonated with me. It never left.”

While he built a career as an accomplished investment banker, he began to dabble with Thoroughbreds. On September 28th, 2002, at Belmont Park, Iavarone claimed the New York-bred gelding Toddler for $75,000. He finished fifth in that race.

Iavarone entered him in the $250,000 Empire Classic for New York-breds. Sent off at 49-1, he finished last in the field of 12, beaten 43 ½ lengths. “It was my first race ever,” Iavarone said. “He was dead last. Got beat nearly 50 lengths. I realized you really needed money to do it.”

So he formed International Equine Acquisitions Holding (IEAH) the following year. Based in Garden City, Long Island, the business operated as a hedge fund with horses as the major asset. Iavarone was the co-CEO with Richard Schiavo, who oversaw administration. Major funding was provided by James Tagliaferri, who ran an asset management company, TAG Virgin Islands. Iavarone was responsible for all equine affairs. Initially, IEAH used four trainers, Dutrow, Dominick Schettino, John Terranova and Donald Chatlos Jr.

Although IEAH would campaign several top runners including Benny the Bull, the 2008 Eclipse Award Champion Sprinter, and Grade 1 winners Kip Deville, I Want Revenge, Court Vision and Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies winner Stardom Bound, it will always be linked to Big Brown, a phenomenal horse who won seven of eight starts, including four Grade 1’s in 2008, the Florida Derby, Kentucky Derby, Preakness Stakes and the Haskell Invitational. IEAH was part of a partnership ownership of the son of Boundary out of the Nureyev mare Mien.

Trained for his first start by Pat Reynolds, Big Brown won his maiden debut by 11 ¼ lengths at Saratoga on the grass at odds of 14-1 under Joe Bravo. He was switched to Dutrow’s barn to prepare for his three-year-old season. Hall of Fame jockey Kent Desormeaux would ride Big Brown in all of his seven subsequent starts.

Dutrow called Big Brown “nothing but fun.”

All of Big Brown’s connections had nothing but fun as he won the Florida Derby by 12 ¾ lengths, the Kentucky Derby by 4 ¾ lengths despite breaking from the extreme outside post in the field of 20 and the Preakness Stakes by 5 ¼.

He would go off at 3-10 in the field of nine in the Belmont Stakes and not even finish the final leg of the Triple Crown.

“Coming out of the Preakness, he was fine,” Iavarone said. “He always had problems with his feet. He had glue-on shoes. He developed a real sore spot at the edge of the corona. We decided not to work him. When you don’t do the work, everyone notices. It turned into an abscess. It took away three days from training. As probably the most famous horse, PETA was calling all day long to not race him in the Belmont.”

The morning of the Belmont Stakes turned very weird. “It’s nine o’clock, and I’m in the shower,” Iavarone said. “I got out and went to the door. There are two guys with badges saying they’re the FBI. They show me a letter that had been sent from an unidentified person saying Rick Dutrow and me would be shot in the head if anything goes wrong with Big Brown. I called Rick. He didn’t care. I had two young kids with me. We had two FBI agents with us all day long, everywhere.”

The afternoon was worse than the morning. When Desormeaux walked Big Brown out of the horse tunnel at Belmont Park and onto the track for the post parade, he looked unbelievably upset. Breaking from the rail, Desormeaux pulled him suddenly to the far outside, and, instead of rallying, he kept getting farther away from the leaders. Desormeaux pulled him up and they walked slowly back to be greeted by his connections, all of them wondering what had happened.

“When he pulled up, I went running,” Iavarone said. “The FBI was running behind me. We go back to the barn. He was fine. Sound as a button. We don’t know why Kent pulled him up. He said, `I knew he was going to finish last. Why push him?’”

And the FBI presence? “To this day, we still don’t know about the threat,” Iavarone said.

Dutrow helped Iavarone place the Triple Crown in perspective. “Rick said, `We still won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness,’” Iavarone said. “That day was more difficult for the horse than it was for us, because he didn’t get the recognition he deserved.”

Big Brown bounced back to win the Grade 1 Haskell Invitational by 1 ¾ lengths and the $500,000 Monmouth Turf Stakes by a neck.

Iavarone has much more pleasant memories at Belmont Park thanks to the Cornell Ruffian Equine Hospital right across the street. IEAH built the facility, the only full-service equine hospital on Long Island. “It started with me having a horse needing to ship to New Bolton (in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania) for colicking and we had trouble getting a van,” Iavarone said.

The hospital opened in 2009, closed in 2011 due to financial difficulties and was sold to Cornell University and renamed in 2014. “We built it and it became very complicated,” Iavarone said. “We couldn’t own the facility. We had to lease the facility. It became very hard. So when Cornell came to us about buying it, I saw a chance. I sold it to them. I’m very proud of it.”

IEAH had bigger problems.

Tagliaferri had been investing money on behalf of its clients and receiving kickbacks disguised as consulting fees. In 2014, Tagliaferri was found guilty of investment advisor fraud, securities fraud and wire fraud causing his clients to lose $50 million. Iavarone was never charged with a crime, but felt the effects as IEAH folded.

“It just turned into a disaster,” Iavarone said. “He wiped out about 90 percent of my personal wealth. We liquidated horses and sold the hospital. It sent me in the wrong direction. I was living a great life. I had to go back to my roots.”

When he rebuilt his business, he felt comfortable to return to racing. He became a partner on Next Shares, a Grade 1 stakes winner who bankrolled nearly $1.9 million, and now owns 18 horses including his recent graded stakes winners Master Piece and O’Connor.

And he’s reunited with Dutrow, who scored one of the most meaningful victories in his career when White Abarrio won the 2023 Breeders’ Cup Classic. “Rick and I have been friends forever,” Iavarone said. “Taking 10 years from a guy’s life? At the end of the day, I hope he learned a lesson. He’s a completely changed person now. The suspension humbled him.”

Dutrow said, “I had a ball training for Mike. He’s got a great personality. I will like anybody in the world who sends me horses like he does. He’s got to send me more horses.”