Conditioning for the Triple Crown series
Article by Bill Heller
The only constant in preparing a young horse for a shot in the Triple Crown is its difficulty. That hasn’t changed over the years.
“It’s just as difficult or more difficult now to have horses that come in healthy, and that’s your main goal: try to get them well-prepared and healthy,” trainer Todd Pletcher, a two-time Kentucky Derby winner with Super Saver (2010) and Always Dreaming (2017), said. “That’s always been a challenge, but probably more so now than ever.”
While the road to the Triple Crown was revamped with the Kentucky Derby point system beginning in 2013, the reality of the Triple Crown is the same: a horse is only going to succeed if he has a proper foundation.
“It’s like any athlete,” trainer Barclay Tagg said. “You have to get the bottom into them and bring them along slowly. It takes a while. You can’t go fast miles. They have to be slow miles. You’re building bones; you’re building tendons; you’re building ligaments all at the same time. You have to have a horse that can handle it, too. He’s got to be able to handle the effort of getting fit, just like a human athlete does. You have to have a hell of a horse to begin with. There’s a lot that goes into it.”
Tagg won the 2003 Kentucky Derby and Preakness with New York-bred Funny Cide. Seventeen years later, his New York-bred Tiz the Law won the Belmont Stakes and Travers Stakes and finished second in the Kentucky Derby. “You had to approach them differently,” Tagg said.
Both Funny Cide and Tiz the Law had three races as a two-year-old in much different company. Funny Cide won all three: a New York-bred maiden race and a pair of New York-bred stakes. Tiz the Law won a maiden race and the G. 1 Champagne before finishing third in the G. 2 Kentucky Jockey Clubs Stakes.
Tagg’s life partner/assistant trainer and exercise rider Robin Smullen, rode both horses: “Funny Cide was impossible to gallop, and by the time I started galloping him, he had holes on both sides of his mouth which bled every day, two holes from trying to run off. The ring bit put holes in the corners of his mouth.”
Tagg originally spotted Funny Cide in a yearling sale and wasn’t impressed: “I didn’t pay attention to him. I took one glance at him and didn’t like him.”
A year later, Tagg was watching Tony Everard train his young two-year-olds: “Then this horse comes barreling by me. It sounds very stupid, but it was the best thing I’d ever seen a horse do. Unbelievably fast. I just fell in love with him right away. I thought this horse ought to be a Derby horse. I know that sounds like a bunch of bull, but it’s the truth.”
It was Funny Cide. “He was so tough to ride,” Tagg said. “Robin had a division for me down at Delaware. I said, `I need you to come ride this horse.’ I got Robin to do everything for him. The rest is history.”
Tiz the Law was much easier to ride. Smullen said, “Tiz the Law was not a Funny Cide. When we were getting him ready for his maiden, we never breezed the horse fast. He had standard breezes of :48 and :49. At Saratoga one day, Mike Welsh (of the Daily Racing Form) called me and asked, `Did you really gallop this horse two miles today?’ I said, `Yeah.’ He said, `Well, there’s not too many people who work a horse two miles.’ And I said, `He likes it. He was very able to do it.’”
Smullen believes strongly in the way she and Tagg develop their young horses: “You have to warm them up well. You should never even think about galloping a horse until you’ve jogged a mile. If he can jog a mile every day, then you turn around and gallop. Even in their yearling year when you’re breaking them. You have to work them up so you don’t mess them up before you get to a race. It’s very important for bones and ligaments and tendons and the whole muscular structure.”
Once they’re fit, they begin an arduous journey. The road to the Kentucky Derby is full of potholes and detours. “The Derby is the only time when a good horse gets beat 35, 40 lengths,” trainer Bob Baffert said. “I’ve seen great horses and great trainers get beat, not win it. You have to break well, take the kickback and get into rhythm.”
You can’t win it when you’re not in it, and Baffert is returning to the Kentucky Derby after a three-year suspension at Churchill Downs following the disqualification of what would have been his historic seventh Derby winner, Medina Spirit, for a failed drug test in 2021.
Medina Spirit died in December that year when he collapsed after a workout. That didn’t make the Derby suspension any easier to deal with for Baffert: “I just blocked everything out. I figured I can’t go. I just said, `Hey, it’s not going to happen.’ It was just weird. I just focus on what’s ahead. I don’t look in the past.”
Baffert’s past in California traces back to legendary trainer Charlie Whittingham: “I watched Charlie Whittingham. He’d put a foundation into his horses before he’d run them. I put a pretty good foundation into them. It’s the way you breeze them.”
Baffert’s first Derby starter, Cavonnier, had six starts as a two-year-old and four as a three-year-old before the Derby: “I didn’t have a program then. Cavonnier took me there.”
When Cavonnier got there, he was confronted in deep stretch by D. Wayne Lukas’ colt Grindstone, beginning a rivalry still going on 30 years later between two trainers who have combined to win 10 Kentucky Derbies.
It took several agonizing minutes before Grindstone, who had drifted to the middle of the track, was declared the winner of an incredibly tight photo. “I thought he won,” Baffert said. “How do you run a mile and a quarter and lose by a nose? That was probably my worst defeat ever. I didn’t think I’d ever get back.”
Wrong. He won the next two Kentucky Derbies and Preakness Stakes with Silver Charm and Real Quiet. If Cavonnier had won that photo, Baffert would have won three straight Kentucky Derbies.
Despite Cavonnier’s narrow loss, Baffert changed his outlook on the Triple Crown: “I said that was a lot of fun. I’m going to change my program to be like Wayne Lukas. Cavonnier got me started. And people started sending me horses. Once I got a taste of it, I made my whole program like Lukas and Pletcher.”
When told of Baffert’s comment, Lukas said, “That’s an ultimate compliment from a guy that’s probably won more often than anybody.”
Baffert won two Triple Crowns with American Pharoah in 2015 and Justify, who did not race as a two-year-old, but is still the only undefeated Triple Crown winner, in 2018. “I usually put a good bottom in them before I run them,” Baffert said. “If you get a horse like Justify, he was a big, strong, heavy horse. I sort of ran him into shape. By the Derby he was at his best.”
Lukas has been at his best for decades, winning his first Triple Crown race- the 1980 Preakness Stakes, with Codex and his latest 44 years later with Seize the Gray. He’s won four Kentucky Derbies with Winning Colors (1988), Thunder Gulch (1995), Grindstone (1996) and Charismatic (1999).
There are many avenues available for trainers to prep for the Kentucky Derby: through California, Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana, Kentucky and New York. Each route offers qualifying points mandatory to get into the Kentucky Derby. “You have to get somewhere to get your points,” Tagg said. “Now, you have to be ready for the races that get you there.”
In the 1995 ‘Run for the Roses’, Lukas saddled three horses, with Timber Country and the filly Serena’s Song joining Thunder Gulch. Timber Country, who would win the Preakness Stakes, was one of the favorites and Thunder Gulch, sent off at 24-1. “I thought Timber Country was our best chance,” Lukas said. “We worked them that Monday and Donna Barton Brothers worked all three horses. She was an excellent work rider and was doing work on a lot of horses for me. Thunder Gulch was last, and when I picked her up on Thunder Gulch, I just casually said, `Well, you just had the best seat in the house. Which one’s our best chance?’ She said, `This one.’ I said, `Are you kidding?’ She said, `I like him the best.’”
When asked if he had changed anything about training horses for the Triple Crown, Lukas said, “I haven’t changed my philosophy at all on it, but I’ve noticed that some of my colleagues, the younger people, are a lot more conservative about the approach they’re taking.
“Back in the ‘50s and the ‘60s, Calumet, with all their success, always used the Derby Trial, which was one week away, as a prep. I paid attention to that a lot. Remember, the old Blue Grass was two weeks in front of the Derby, and it was one of the major preps. Now they keep moving the stakes back, like the Arkansas Derby. It had always been three weeks, now it’s five weeks. They move it back, I think, to appease the mindset of a lot of the younger trainers now. I particularly have found that most of my horses run better, horses that I have had really good success with, not necessarily winning but were competitive, ran within a month of the Derby. I used the Lexington a couple of times, and they ran well, maybe 10 days before the race.
“One of the things that I find in watching it for 50 years is, if Bob Baffert worked a horse in 1:12, the press would come over and tell everybody. A lot of these younger trainers will think, `Geez, maybe I better work my horse in 1:12.”
Lukas doesn’t: “I just think if you put good, stout gallops into them and build them up to the race, you’re better off. The reality is, if the horse is dead fit, his pedigree will either get them there or not. Strong, solid works and strong morning gallops are more instrumental. I think you put a solid bottom in them and get them into a good work pattern. Reading the horse is the hardest thing for the Derby.”
Deciding which route to get there is challenging. New York has a surprising trend. From 1930 to 2000, 11 winners of the mile-and-an-eighth Wood Memorial, now a Gr.2 stakes, won the Kentucky Derby, the last being Fusaichi Pegasus in 2000. Triple Crown winners Gallant Fox, Count Fleet, Assault, Secretariat (who finished third to his stable-mate Angle Light in 1973), all ventured to Aqueduct to compete in the Wood. From 2001 through 2024, the Wood winners haven’t added the Kentucky Derby to their resumes, though Empire Maker, Vino Rosso, Tacitus and Mo Donegal won other Gr.1 stakes.
However, another New York-bred Derby prep race, the Gr.2 Remsen Stakes for two-year-olds, annually run at Aqueduct in November after the Gr.1 Breeders’ Cup, has become an important stepping stone to future success.
Catholic Boy, the 2017 Remsen winner in a rout, returned at three to win the 2018 Travers by daylight. Mo Donegal (2021) won the 2022 Belmont Stakes. In the 2023 Remsen, Dornoch nosed Sierra Leone. Dornoch subsequently won the 2024 Belmont Stakes and the Haskell. Sierra Leone won the Blue Grass, finished second by a nose in the 2024 Kentucky Derby and won the Breeders’ Cup Classic.
Dornoch’s trainer, Danny Gargan, won the 2022 Remsen with Dubyuhnell, and chose the 2023 Remsen for Dornoch. He relished the Remsen distance of a mile-and-an-eighth: “That’s why we picked it. We always knew the further the distance the better for him. We wanted to get a two-turn race into him. You never knew going in that Sierra Leone was going to be in there. It became a key race. Both of them are multiple Grade 1 winners. One of them won the Breeders’ Cup Classic and the other won the Belmont. So it was a key race.”
Gargan appreciates the Aqueduct surface: “I’ve won the Remsen a couple of times. Aqueduct is a deep, demanding track, and it takes a fit, strong horse to be able to get that distance on that track. I think it’s beneficial if you want to get to the Derby to have a horse that can go that far. That’s the longest two-year-old race of the year. I think it helps them. There’s been some nice horses win the race the last few years. Everybody wants to say it’s not a key race, but it sure has been the last three or four years. People can say what they want, but it brings out the true distance horse. It’s all timing when you train these horses. You have to be lucky enough to have a horse that can go that far at that time.”
Though he trains in California, Eoin Harty thought the Remsen made a lot of sense for his two-year-old Poster last year. He’d won his first two starts on grass, a maiden race at Ellis Park and an allowance race at Keeneland in his first two career starts: “It was a good opportunity to see and find out whether he was capable of running on dirt. He’s a big angular horse. He’s been like that since Day One. That’s why I stretched him to a mile on the turf first time out.”
He said putting a bottom in a horse is important, but doesn’t guarantee success in longer races: “You could get an average horse, and you can put all the bottom in the world into him and he’d barely get a foot over six furlongs. It’s important, but by the time most trainers, myself included, get their hands on these horses, that baseline has been put up there. We all get these horses around the same time, usually May of the two-year-old year. And by then, it’s too late. It’s usually something I just don’t have to worry about.”
He didn’t worry about it in the 2024 Remsen. With Flavian Prat in the saddle for the first time, Poster won the Remsen by a nose. In his three-year-old debut in the mile and a sixteenth Sam F. Davis at Tampa Bay Downs, Poster got away last in the field of 10 and rallied wide to finish third by 2 ¾ lengths to John Hancock.
Harty thinks Poster will make the Derby’s mile-and-a-quarter distance if he’s given that opportunity: “I predict that he can make it, but he’s going to have to prove to me that he can make it. I mean, if, by the grace of God, I get into the starting gate on Derby Day, his ability to make a mile and a quarter won’t be a question for me. It’s up to me to have him fit to go a mile and a quarter. At some points, genetics take over. The horse will get home on his own. I think he’s the kind of horse that will go a mile and a quarter for sure.”
Justify & Jimson Weed - from the racetrack to the courtroom - positive test result for a banned substance on race day
By Peter J. Sacopulos
Justify’s victory in the 2018 Santa Anita Derby served as the springboard for trainer Bob Baffert’s second Triple Crown triumph. In the wake of a 2019 New York Times article revealing the colt had tested positive for a banned substance on race day, Ruis Racing has filed a lawsuit against the California Horse Racing Board. Ruis claims the CHRB failed to do its duty, and the 2018 victory and the $600,000 first-place purse rightfully belong to Bolt d’Oro.
Justify with trainer Bob Baffert.
A Duel at Santa Anita
As the starting bell sounded for the million-dollar Santa Anita Derby on April 7, 2018, folks who knew racing knew the contest was likely to come down to a duel between two horses: Bolt d’Oro and Justify. Both were big, beautiful and born to run. Bolt d’Oro, owned/trained by Mick Ruis and ridden by Javier Castellano, had experience on his side. Justify, trained by Bob Baffert, had only two races to his credit, but the handsome colt had won both and was already tagged as a rising star. A first- or second-place finish in Santa Anita would guarantee a spot in the Kentucky Derby, and Baffert, who had captured the Triple Crown with American Pharaoh only three years earlier, publicly hinted that his latest protégé could go all the way as well.
Baffert’s confidence seemed well placed when Justify, ridden by Mike E. Smith, took an early lead. Having firmly established themselves in second place, Castellano and Bolt D’Oro made their move in the final turn. With announcer Mike Worna describing the match as “prodigious talent versus established class,” Bolt d’Oro closed the gap and appeared ready to nose it out. But Justify sprang ahead in the final furlong, and prodigious talent won the day in an electrifying climax.
History in the Making
The rest, as they say, is history. Bob Baffert and Justify kept their string of victories going through a muddy Kentucky Derby, a foggy, rain-soaked Preakness, and a beautiful day at Belmont. Justify became the thirteenth horse to win the Triple Crown, and Baffert decked his already legendary status with fresh laurels. The trainer had chalked up an astonishing two Triple Crowns, five Kentucky Derbies, seven Preakness Stakes, three Belmont Stakes and three Kentucky Oaks.
Baffert had his eyes on The Grand Slam, but a problem with his superstar’s left front ankle led to the stallion’s retirement in late July 2018. Justify had earned $3,798,000 in six races. He followed Seattle Slew as the second winner in Triple Crown history to retire undefeated. Breeding rights were sold for a reported $60 million, plus a $25-million bonus for the Triple Crown triumph. Justify’s stud fee was reportedly set at $150,000.
A Stunning Revelation & Angry Allegations
Then, last fall, a dark cloud appeared above the green pastures of Justify’s retirement. On September 11, 2019, The New York Times ran an article headlined, “Justify Failed a Drug Test Before Winning the Triple Crown.” Racing journalist Joe Drape revealed what the California Horse Racing Board and the horse’s trainer and owners had managed to keep secret for over a year. Justify had tested over the acceptable limit for scopolamine on the day of his crucial victory at Santa Anita.
That would have been a bombshell in and of itself. But the article went on to detail a series of questionable actions by the California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) in the aftermath of the positive test. Actions that, in the eyes of many, defied logic, violated procedure, and made mockery of ethics and transparency. Some even claimed the governing body had violated California law.
Less than two weeks after the Times article appeared, California Governor Gavin Newsom publicly blasted the CHRB and the horse racing industry. “What happened last year was unacceptable, and all of the excuses be damned. We own that going into next season, and we’re going to have to do something about it,” Newsom told the Times. “I’ll tell you, talk about a sport whose time is up unless they reform. That’s horse racing,” the governor continued. He went on to excoriate the industry’s treatment of racehorses and warn that industries that don’t reform themselves get reformed by others.
A race becomes a case
Bolt d’Oro
In January 2020, Ruis Racing, which owned and trained Bolt d’Oro, filed a lawsuit in the California courts. The suit contends that, under the California rules for Thoroughbred racing, Justify must be disqualified from the 2018 Santa Anita Derby, Bolt d’Oro must be recognized as the race’s rightful winner, and Ruis Racing must be awarded the first-place prize money. ($600,000 vs. their $200,000 second-place purse.) The suit also claims that the CHRB knowingly violated statutes and procedures, and that Ruis Racing is entitled to compensatory damages and reimbursement for all legal costs incurred by the suit.
Trainer Bob Baffert is interviewed after winning the 2018 Santa Anita Derby.
In the wake of the first Times article, Bob Baffert released a statement declaring that neither he nor his staff administered scopolamine to Justify prior to the Santa Anita run, or to any of his horses, ever. The statement said the substance had undoubtedly entered the horse’s system due to ingesting jimson weed—a natural source of scopolamine that can turn up in hay, straw and cereal grains. Baffert further stated that the CHRB had found no wrongdoing, that he had no influence over the Board or its decisions, and that Justify had tested clean in all of his other races.
Getting into the Weeds
Justify, ridden by Mike Smith, in the winners circle after winning the 2018 Santa Anita Derby.
Baffert’s statement correctly identified jimson weed as an environmental source of scopolamine. The chemical is a naturally occurring alkaloid found in noxious plants, including jimson weed. Invasive and aggressive, jimson weed is despised by farmers around the globe. Its defenses against nature’s plant-eaters include thorny seed pods, an unpleasant smell, and an extremely bitter flavor. Scopolamine not only contributes to the plant’s unappetizing taste, it adds toxicity. Though used in small amounts in human digestive remedies for centuries, modern medical experts consider jimson weed ineffective and unsafe, since ingesting the plant or its seeds can produce vomiting, seizures, muscle cramps and death. Its toxic effects extend to horses as well. …
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Remembering - Seattle Slew - 1977 Triple Crown winner
By Ed Golden
All photographs published by kind permission of Hollywood Park archive
Bob Baffert was a young pup of 24, fresh out of college about to make a name for himself training Quarter horses at outposts in Arizona like Sonoita and Rillito when Seattle Slew became the first undefeated Triple Crown winner in 1977.
Forty-one years later, in 2018, Baffert followed suit, deftly leading Justify successfully down racing’s Yellow Brick Road to become only the second undefeated Triple Crown winner in history.
Now 67, the most recognizable trainer on the planet is a two-time Triple Crown winner (American Pharoah in 2015), and had the fates allowed, could have been a four-time winner, save for Silver Charm losing the 1997 Belmont Stakes by a length and Real Quiet by an excruciating nose the very next year in a defeat that smarts to this day.
Still young at heart four decades after he began his career, Baffert has fond memories of Seattle Slew, who became one of racing’s giants despite being purchased for the miniscule sum of $17,500.
“I was 24 and still in college I think, but I saw Seattle Slew win the Derby, the Preakness and the Belmont on TV, even though I wasn’t into watching a lot of Thoroughbred races,” Baffert said. “I was still a Quarter horse guy.
“But when I saw him run, I knew the name, and it was a great name—one that stuck with you.
Seattle Slew in the stable area at Hollywood Park,1977.
“He was a most impressive horse, especially because in the paddock, he looked completely washed out but would run a hole in the wind.”
He would use up so much energy before a race and still destroy the opposition; and that’s a trait he throws (in his bloodlines).
“He ran as a four-year-old at Hollywood Park and got beat, and then I quit watching him because I lost interest after that. But to me, he was one of the greatest horses I ever saw run on YouTube.”
***
The following story is about Seattle Slew: part Seabiscuit, part Secretariat. It was published on May 14, 2002, but is appropriately resurrected here in advance of this year’s altered Triple Crown.
This is an exclusive firsthand interview the author obtained with the late Doug Peterson—a bear of a man who trained Seattle Slew in his four-year-old season and who provided a Runyonesque tale of the horse and those closest to him before his untimely death of an apparent accidental prescription drug overdose on Nov. 21, 2004 at age 53.
Seattle Slew being saddled in the paddock before the Swaps Stakes at Hollywood Park, 1977.
(Reprinted courtesy of Gaming Today)
Great race horses do not necessarily prove to be great stallions.
Citation and Secretariat were champions on the track, but each was a dud at stud. Cigar was a king on the track but fired blanks in the breeding shed. He was infertile.
But one Thoroughbred that succeeded on both fronts was Seattle Slew, who in 1977 became the only undefeated horse to win the Triple Crown.
One of racing’s all-time bargains as a $17,500 yearling purchase, Seattle Slew died last Tuesday in Lexington, Ky., exactly 25 years to the day of his Kentucky Derby triumph. He was 28 and still productive at stud, despite falling victim to the rigors of old age in recent years.
Seattle Slew in the stable area at Hollywood Park,1977.
His stud fee was $100,000 at the time of his death and $300,000 at its apex.
Here was a horse for the ages—the likes of which racing may never see again. Consider this: at two, he broke his maiden in his first attempt, and two races later won the Champagne Stakes; at three, he won the Derby, the Flamingo, the Wood Memorial, the Preakness and the Belmont.
At four, he won the Marlboro Cup, the Woodward and the Stuyvesant. He won the Derby by 1¾ lengths as the 1-2 favorite in a 15-horse field. Overall, the dark bay son of Bold Reasoning won 14 of 17 starts and earned $1,208,726.
Doug Peterson was a naïve kid of 26 when he took over the training of Seattle Slew from Billy Turner, who conditioned him for owners Karen and Mickey Taylor through the Triple Crown.
Now 50, Peterson is a mainstay on the Southern California circuit where he operates a successful, if nondescript, stable. But his memories of the great ‘Slew are ever vivid.
“I got Seattle Slew late in his three-year-old year, after he got beat by J.O. Tobin at Hollywood Park (in the Swaps Stakes),” Peterson recalled. “Billy Turner brought him out here, but he didn’t want to run him. As the horse was getting off the van and they slid up the screen door that was on the top of his stall, it fell down and hit him on the head.
“The day of the race he had a temperature. That’s why he couldn’t make the lead. There was no horse ever going to be in front of this horse, but despite the temperature, they ran him anyway because of all the hype and all the money and all the fans who wanted to see him. That’s what started the disagreement between the Taylors and Turner.”
Peterson got his chance to train Seattle Slew through a stroke of good fortune.
“I was in Hot Springs, Arkansas, sitting on a bucket,” Peterson said. “I was cold and down and out, and this girl—an assistant for another trainer—came by and told me, ‘If you’re going to make it big, you’ve got to go to New York.’ I packed up with two bums and went to New York.
“I got stables at Belmont Park on the backside of Billy Turner, but that was just a coincidence. Turns out, I was in the right place at the right time because Dr. (Jim) Hill was the veterinarian for Billy, and he came to my barn and I asked him to work on a couple of my horses.
“Dr. Hill recognized my horsemanship, and he and Mickey Taylor were buying 15 yearlings. They were going to need two trainers, and this is how the whole thing started. They said Billy would have a string and I would have a string. Well, before the next year, they fired Billy. …
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Fast or Slow - examining different training methods
By Bill Heller
Bill Heller talks to Jason Servis and Bob Baffert about fast versus slow training methods.
Just hours apart, trainers Jason Servis and Bob Baffert saddled Gr1 winners on Saturday, December 7.
Jason Servis
Servis’ outstanding three-year-old colt Maximum Security captured the Gr1 Cigar Mile easily at Aqueduct off three extremely slow workouts.
Twenty-eight hundred miles away at Los Alamitos, where he also won the Gr2 Los Alamitos Futurity for two-year-olds with Thousand Words, Baffert’s Bast won the Gr1 Starlet for two-year-old fillies. Both two-year-olds had fast works, as most of Baffert’s horses do.
These two trainers couldn’t be more different regarding published workouts, yet their success in 2019 was eerily similar. Through late December, Servis ranked eighth nationally in earnings ($10.9 million from 563 starts). Baffert was ninth with $10.0 million from just 317 starts.
“Jason and Bob—they’re completely different,” Servis’ brother John, who trained 2004 Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner Smarty Jones, said. “Jason has a whole different way.”
Even with the same client. Baffert and Servis each trained Kentucky Derby three-year-olds for Gary and Mary West, who own Maximum Security and Baffert-trained Game Winner, last year’s Two-Year-Old Champion. Each three-year-old’s works for the Derby reflected their trainers’ different approaches.
Slow works versus fast. Two schools of thought: Horses don’t need fast works in the morning to run fast in the afternoon, or, horses must run fast in the morning to run fast in the afternoon.
The great majority of trainers fall somewhere between those two extremes. But to Servis and Baffert, they aren’t extremes; rather, it is what they have come to believe is the best way to prepare Thoroughbreds for a race. They didn’t reach that opinion overnight but rather through decades of watching and training Thoroughbreds.
Jason said, “There are so many people that train for speed.” He does not. He prefers timed two-minute gallops. “That doesn’t mean it’s right or wrong,” he said. “That’s how I do it.”
Baffert said, “In California, it’s different. You go fast. Your horses have to be sharper. If I trained on the East Coast, I wouldn’t train the way I do. The tracks there are sandier and deeper.”
Given their ongoing huge success, why would either trainer want to change the way they’ve been prepping their horses?
Servis and Baffert have vastly different backgrounds and experiences. Servis, 62, didn’t begin training until he was 43, sending out a single horse for one start. The following year in 2002, he won 14 races from 71 starts.
Baffert, who turned 67 on Jan. 13, was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2009—years before he trained Triple Crown Champions American Pharoah (2015) and undefeated Justify (2018).
Servis was born into the business in Charles Town, W. Va., where his father, Joe, rode for 11 years and won more than 500 races before becoming the manager of the Jockey Guild and a steward at Charles Town. He was inducted into the Charles Town Hall of Fame in 2010.
Growing up, Jason and John would play in a nearby farmer’s field, trying to rope Shetland ponies and ride them.
“Charles Town—that’s where I cut my teeth,” Jason said. “No money. But they were the good old days. My dad made me. I learned the straight and narrow. Work hard. Keep your nose clean.”
At the age of 15, Jason became a jockey, riding at Shenandoah Downs, just outside Charles Town. He didn’t last long, conceding to his increasing weight and height and switching to exercise riding. “I did it for a lot of years before I started training,” he said. “I galloped horses for a lot of people: Gene Jacobs at Gulfstream Park in the early ‘70s, Cy Butler, Stan Hough, Alan Goldberg—a lot of good people. I had seen a lot. It was a very good education for me.”
Servis eventually settled at Monmouth Park, where he worked as an exercise rider in the mornings and a jockey’s valet in the afternoon. Eventually, he worked as an exercise rider and assistant trainer to Peter Fortay. “I was with him for 10 years,” Servis said. “When I finally made my transition, it wasn’t by design. He passed away. Before, when he was sick, I was basically doing it on my own. The last five years, I was open-galloping. I started two-minute clips. I just got into that groove, especially after claiming horses. Get the weight on them. Keep your horses happy. Once they’re fit, stay out of their way.”
When Fortay passed, one of his owners, Dennis Drazin, asked Servis a fateful question. “He said, `Why not go to New York with a couple horses I own and train them?’” Servis said. “I was taking care of my two kids, Garrett and Evan. They were 10 and 12. I was galloping horses, $10 a head. Colts Neck (New Jersey) in February in the cold. So I did it. We claimed a couple horses. Did some good. Dennis helped me with the payroll.”
Servis quickly got a call from Jimmy Croll. He asked Servis, “Are you training?” When Servis said he was, Croll asked, “Why’d it take so long? I’m sending you two horses.”
They won. Soon Servis was receiving plenty of phone calls. He was claiming horses and winning at a high percentage. “I’ll claim horses, and I’ll gallop them a mile in 2:05.” He said. “Get them down to 1:57 or 1:58, depending on the horse. If it’s a filly, I’ll go 2:07 or 2:08 at first. My riders are good. They wear watches. Guys who have been with me for 15 years.”
In 2017, Servis finished 23rd in the country in earnings—his highest rank ever. The next year he jumped up to 12th, and in 2019, he cracked the Top Ten with more than $10 million in earnings for the first time.
Maximum Security
Maximum Security, his horse of a lifetime, debuted on Dec. 21, 2018, at Gulfstream Park in a maiden $16,000 claimer, winning by 5 ¾ lengths at 5-2. “I can’t believe he ran the horse for $16,000,” Baffert said.
No harm, no foul. Maximum Security wasn’t claimed and proceeded to win a pair of allowance races by 6 ¼ and 18 ¼ lengths. That led to his step up to the Gr1 Florida Derby. Servis gave him one published workout at Palm Meadows Training Center, four furlongs in :52 4/5, the slowest of 64 horses who worked the morning of March 22, eight days before the Florida Derby. He won the Florida Derby by 3 ½ lengths.
For the Kentucky Derby, Maximum Security had three published workouts at Palm Meadows, four furlongs in :54 4/5, slowest of 51 works; three furlongs in :42, slowest of 15 works and four furlongs in :53 4/5, slowest of six.
Servis was more concerned with the open gallops Maximum Security had heading into the Derby. “I wanted him to gallop a 1:57 or 1:58 mile every nine, 10 days,” he said. “Before the Derby, my rider screwed up. He went 2:02, then 2:01. I was really upset. That rider is no longer with me. So, on Derby Day, I blew him out in :23. It was the 12th race that day (post time 6:50 p.m.). He worked at a quarter to six. He cooled off, laid down and took a nap. The clockers had it. Blowouts aren’t for every horse.”
Unless you’ve been on Mars, you know that Maximum Security won the Derby by a length and three-quarters but was disqualified and placed 17th. Regardless, there’s little debate who were by far the best horses on that memorable afternoon, which resulted in the first disqualification of the Derby’s long history.
Maximum Security returned to finish second by a length in the ungraded Pegasus stakes before sweeping the Gr1 Haskell by a length and a quarter, the Gr3 Bold Ruler Stakes against older horses by a length and three-quarters, and again against older horses, the Gr1 Cigar Mile by 3 ¼ lengths, cementing his three-year-old championship.
For the Bold Ruler, his first start in three months, Maximum Security worked four furlongs in :54 4/5, slowest of 74, and four furlongs in :52 4/5, second slowest of 50. For the Cigar Mile, he worked three furlongs in :40 4/5, slowest of six; four furlongs in :52, 26th fastest of 31, and three furlongs in :42 1/5, slowest of 14.
“Would Maximum Security have won those races with fast works?” Servis mused. “He probably would have. He’s a great horse.”
His trainer didn’t hurt his chances. Servis’ win percentage in 2019 was 29. For his career, it’s 25 percent. He just may know what he’s doing.
While 2019 was a breakthrough year for Servis, for Baffert, finishing 10th in earnings was only the second time since 2009 he hadn’t finished in the top three—he was fourth in 2016. He probably couldn’t care less, nor should he.
Baffert, who was closing in on 3,000 victories in January, won 24 percent of his races in 2019 and has a career winning percentage of 25.
Winning two Triple Crowns after being voted into the Hall of Fame? That’s rarified air—success he couldn’t possibly have dreamed of growing up on a ranch in Nogales, Ariz., where his family raised cattle and chickens. When he was 10, his father purchased a few Quarter Horses, leading Baffert to riding them. He won his first race at the age of 17 in 1970.
Baffert graduated from the University of Arizona’s Race Track Industry Program with a Bachelor of Science Degree. He soon began training Quarter Horses before moving to Los Alamitos and eventually mirroring Hall of Fame trainer D. Wayne Lukas, who was a force in Quarter Horse racing and became one of the greatest Thoroughbred trainers ever.
Trainers have fewer options with Quarter Horses than with Thoroughbreds. “At Los Alamitos (for Quarter Horses), you had to qualify running 350 yards from the gate, hand-timed,” Baffert said. “They had to be fit, ready and in good form.”
Bast
When he switched to Thoroughbreds, he became particularly adept at having his three-year-olds ready for the Triple Crown races. Baffert nearly won three consecutive Kentucky Derbies when Cavonnier lost the 1996 Derby by a nose to Grindstone and then his Silver Charm and Real Quiet won the next two runnings, as well as the Preakness both years. The elusive Triple Crown was finally nailed by Baffert in 2015 when American Pharoah became the first Triple Crown winner since Affirmed in 1978, and unbeaten Justify went from first-time starter to Triple Crown Champion in an astonishing 111 days before retiring.
“Once Justify got into the Belmont, he was in top, top shape,” Baffert said. “Before, he was a little heavy. He had some baby fat. I think we ran him into shape. I’d rather run them than train them.”…
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Personal preference - training from horseback or the ground
By Ed Golden
At 83, when many men his age are riding wheelchairs in assisted living facilities, Darrell Wayne Lukas is riding shotgun on a pony at Thoroughbred ports of call from coast to coast, sending his stalwarts through drills to compete at the game’s highest level.
Darrell Wayne Lukas accompanies Bravazo, ridden by Danielle Rosier
One of three children born to Czechoslovakian immigrants, Lukas began training quarter horses full time in 1967 at Park Jefferson in South Dakota. He came to California in 1972 and switched to Thoroughbred racing in 1978. Rather than train at ground level as most horsemen do, Lukas has called the shots on horseback lo these many years, winning the most prestigious races around the globe.
A native of Antigo, Wisconsin, he was an assistant basketball coach at the University of Wisconsin for two years and coached nine years at the high school level, earning a master’s degree in education at his alma mater before going from the hardwood to horses.
His innovations have become racing institutions, as his Thoroughbred charges have won nearly 4,800 races and earned some $280 million. They are second nature to him now.
“I’m on a horse every day for four to five hours,” said Lukas, who’s usually first in line. “I open the gate for the track crew every morning. I ride a good horse, and I make everybody who works for me ride one.
“My wife (Laurie) rides out most days. She’s got a good saddle horse. I make sure my number one assistant, Bas (Sebastian Nichols) rides, too.”
The Hall of Fame trainer is unwavering in his stance.
“I want to be close to my horses’ training, because I think most of the responses from the exercise rider and the horse are immediate on the pull up after the workout or the exercise,” Lukas said.
“I don’t want that response 20 minutes later as they walk leisurely back to the barn. I want it right there. If I’m working a horse five-eighths, and I have some question about its condition, I want to see how hard it’s breathing myself, before it gets back to the barn.
“I’ve always been on a pony when my horses train, ever since I started. I’ve never trained from the ground. If my assistants don’t know how to ride, they have to take riding lessons, and they’ve got to learn how to ride. I insist on them being on horseback.”
Wesley Ward, a former jockey and the 1984 Eclipse Award winner as the nation’s leading apprentice rider, is a landlubber these days as a trainer, yet has achieved plaudits on the international stage.
Wesley Ward
“I don’t think there’s any advantage at all on horseback,” said Ward, who turns 51 on March 3. “Look at (the late) Charlie Whittingham. “He’s the most accomplished trainer in history, I think, and he wasn’t on a pony . . . Everybody’s different. It’s just a matter of style. I can see more from the grandstand when the horses work.
“I like to see the entire view, and on a pony, you’re kind of restricted to ground level, so you can’t really tell how fast or how slow or how good they’re going.
“I like to step back and observe the big picture when my horses work. I can check on them up close when they’re at the barn. But all trainers are different. Some like to be close to their horses and see each and every stride. I’ve tried it both ways, and I like it better from an overview.”
Two-time Triple Crown-winning trainer Bob Baffert, himself a former rider, employs the innovative Dick Tracy method: two-way radio from the ground to maintain contact with his workers on the track.
Bob Baffert
“I used to train on horseback,” said Baffert, who celebrated his 66th birthday on Jan. 13, “but you can’t really see the whole deal when you’re sitting on the track. From the grandstand, you can see the horses’ legs better and you can pick up more.
“On horseback, you can’t tell how fast a horse is really going until it gets right up to you. That’s why I switched. I have at least one assistant with a radio who’s on horseback, and I can contact him if someone on the track has a problem.”
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Standing in the wings - Assistant Trainers
By Ed Golden
The term “second banana” originated in the burlesque era, which enjoyed its heyday from the 1840s to the 1940s.
There was an extremely popular comedy skit where the main comic was given a banana after delivering the punch line to a particularly funny joke. The skit and joke were so widely known that the term “top banana” was coined to refer to anyone in the top position of an organization.
The term “second banana,” referring to someone at a pejorative plateau, had a similar origin from the same skit. There would have been no Martin without Lewis, no Abbott without Costello, and no Laurel without Hardy.
Racing has its own version of second bananas, only they’re not in it for the yuks. They’re called assistants, and it’s a serious business.
Most of the laughs come in the winner’s circle, and if not outright guffaws, there at least have been miles of smiles for Hall of Fame trainer Jerry Hollendorfer and assistant Dan Ward, who spent 22 years with the late Bobby Frankel before joining Hollendorfer in 2007.
While clandestinely harboring caring emotions in their souls, on the surface, Frankel did not suffer fools well, nor does Hollendorfer. A cynic has said Ward should have been eligible for combat pay during those tours.
But he endures, currently with one of the largest and most successful barns in the nation, with 50 head at Santa Anita alone. Hollendorfer hasn’t won more than 7,400 races being lucky. It is a labor of love through dedication and scrutinization to the nth degree, leaving little or nothing to chance.
A typical day for the 71-year-old Hollendorfer and the 59-year-old Ward would challenge the workload of executives at any major corporate level. Two-hour lunches and coffee breaks are not on their priority list.
“I get to the track before three in the morning,” Ward said, “because we starting jogging horses at 3:30. It takes about a half-hour until we get every horse outside, check their legs, jog them up and down the road, and if we see something that will change our routine--the horse doesn’t look like it’s jogging right or if it’s got a hot foot--we’ll adjust the schedule.
“We won’t send a horse to the track without seeing it jog. We’ll watch all the horses breeze, and if something unexpected happens that we have to deal with, we diagnose it and take care of it. Meanwhile, we’re also going over entries and the condition book, making travel arrangements and staying current on out-of-town stakes and nominations.
“Each time a new condition book comes out, I go over it with Jerry, we agree on which races to run in, and then go out and try and find riders.
“I’ll ask him what claiming price we should run a horse for, but with big stakes horses, the owners have the final say. Jerry and I usually agree on the overnight races, but in some big stakes, it might take more time deciding which horses run in what races. All this consumes most of the day, plus doing the time sheets and the payroll.”
It’s a full plate even with a shared workload, but Ward is considering flying solo should a favorable chance come his way.
“I’m hoping to go on my own,” he said. “Right now, I’m in a very good position, but if the right opportunity comes along, or if Jerry one day decides not to train anymore, I would be qualified to take over. In the future, however, I definitely hope to train on my own.”
Despite his workaholic demeanor, Ward has found time recently to enjoy a slice of life in the domestic domain.
“I was married for a year on March 6 and it’s been the best time,” he said. “My wife (Carol) already had two kids, and now they’re our kids, and it’s really great.”
Ward is a worldly man with diversity of thought, traits Hollendorfer sought when he brought him on board.
“In my barn, I often give the reins to my assistants,” Hollendorfer said. “I like them to make decisions, so when I hired Dan Ward I told him that I wasn’t looking for a ‘yes man’ but for somebody who would state his opinion, and if he felt strongly about it, to stand his ground.
“I make the final decisions, but I want a person who is not afraid to make decisions and lets me know what’s going on when I’m not there. There’s not a successful trainer I know of who doesn’t fully have good support back at his barn, and that’s where I’m coming from.
“It’s not only Dan who makes important contributions, it’s (assistants) John Chatlos at Los Alamitos and Juan Arriaga and (wife) Janet Hollendorfer in Northern California.
“Your supporting cast of assistant trainers has to be solid, too,” said Hollendorfer, who had a trio of three-year-olds hoping to prove they were Triple Crown worthy at press time: Choo Choo, a son of English Channel owned and bred by Calumet Farm; Lecomte winner Instilled Regard; and San Vicente winner Kanthaka.
“If horses are good enough to go (on the Triple Crown trail), you go,” Ward said. “If you miss it, you concentrate on a late-season campaign. It worked well for Shared Belief and Battle of Midway.” Shared Belief, champion two-year-old male of 2013, won 10 of 12 career starts but missed the 2014 Kentucky Derby due to an abscess in his right front foot. Given the necessary time off, he recovered and won the Pacific Classic later that year, and in 2015, the Santa Anita Handicap.
Battle of Midway outran his odds of 40-1 finishing third in the 2017 Kentucky Derby and won the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile last November.
Ron McAnally, in the homestretch of a Hall of Fame career that has reaped a treasure trove of icons led by two-time Horse of the Year John Henry, is down to a dozen runners at age 85, none poised to join Bayakoa, Paseana, Northern Spur, and Tight Spot on the trainer’s list of champions. As McAnally says, “I have outlived all my owners,” save for his wife, Deborah, and a handful of others.
Still, maiden or lowly claimer, Thoroughbreds deserve the best of care, which any dedicated trainer readily provides, cost be damned. His glorious past well behind him, trouper that he is, McAnally remains a regular at Santa Anita, although leaving all the heavy lifting to longtime assistant Dan Landers.
Landers was born in a racing trunk, to paraphrase an old show business lexicon. His late father, Dale, rode at Santa Anita the first day it opened, on Christmas Day 1934, and won the second race on a horse named Let Her Play. Landers still has a chart of the race.
“Even if I weren’t here for a few weeks, Dan would know what to do because he’s been with us a long time,” McAnally said. “Dan really works hard, and although he’s got three or four grooms, if they don’t perform their duties as they should, he finds someone else.
“That’s the type of guy he is. He wants things done perfectly--the barn is always clean--and that’s what you look for in an assistant, someone who can take your place when you’re not there, and he’s there.
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Sid Fernando - What have you done for me lately?
Juddmonte Farms’ Arrogate, the champion three-year-old colt of 2016, has won seven of 11 starts and earned $17,302,600 – a record for a North American-trained racehorse – he entered the Breeders’ Cup Classic, but following two consecutive losses, in the Grade 2 San Diego Handicap on July 22 and the Grade 1 Pacific Classic on August 19, he did not go off as the favorite in the race.
It wasn’t that long ago, following emphatic wins in the Grade 1 Pegasus World Cup Invitational Stakes in January and the Grade 1 Dubai World Cup Sponsored by Emirates Airlines in March, that he was being heralded in the media as one of the all-time greats. But in a classic case of “What have you done for me lately?”, the big grey son of Unbridled’s Song’s stock has plummeted. His workouts leading up to the Classic had been put under the microscope by all types of “experts” on social media, and their consensus view is that Arrogate didn’t train as well as he did last year before he defeated California Chrome in a thriller of a Classic.
Some of these same folks, however, had said the same thing about Arrogate before the Pegasus – there’d been an issue with his right hind foot that required a three-quarter shoe – but Arrogate won that race in brilliant style.
Arrogate’s losses this year have all been at Del Mar, the site of the Breeders’ Cup, and the track’s surface has also been mentioned as a culprit. He’d run at Del Mar last year in an allowance race in early August that he’d won by “only” a length and a quarter, but in his next start, the Grade 1 Travers at Saratoga, he’d walloped a field by 13-and-a-half lengths at 11.70-1 in track-record time...
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Cross training - what thoroughbred trainers can learn from their standardbred and quarter horse counterparts
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