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.