Leonard Powell - the French trainer in California

By Ed Golden

“When I learn that a nation can live without bread, then I will believe that the French people can live without glory.”—Charles de Gaulle

Leonard Powell can live without neither, although with a workload that consumes the majority of his very existence, he still finds time for required sustenance and moments of exultation when they present themselves.

The 42-year-old Frenchman is a world-class horseman, weaned on Thoroughbreds from early youth, starting on his family’s 200-acre stud farm in Normandy followed by stops around the globe in Australia, England, Singapore and the United States, and calling California home since 2004.

When attempting to buttonhole him in person, however, an APB might come in handy. At Santa Anita, his base of operations, a sighting at the track’s popular early morning watering hole, Clockers’ Corner, is rarer than a Triple Crown sweep.

Leonard Powell is either sedulously conducting business at his barn, or high upon horseback supervising jogs, gallops and breezes on the track.

A former amateur jockey in France, where he rode in steeplechase races as well as on the flat, landing in the winner’s circle on occasion, his work schedule is Trumpian sans the tweets.

“I wake up at 3:45 and leave the house just after four,” Powell said explaining a typical day—his accent as thick as one of France’s nearly 300 varieties of cheese. “I get to the barn just after 4:30, check the horses and provide any medications as needed.

“The first set of horses goes out at 5 o’clock, so from 5 o’clock until 10 o’clock I’m on horseback, either on a Thoroughbred or a pony. At 10 we school horses if necessary, review their condition with a veterinarian or myself, check on the horses that worked the day before or that morning.

“That takes us to 11:30 or 12. Usually from 12 to about two I go over paperwork that needs to be done in the office. In the afternoon, we go to the races when we have horses running, or back to the barn feeding, walking or grazing them until 4:30.”

Powell’s day begins well before he arrives at the barn. He commutes from his West Hollywood home to the Arcadia track, a stretch of 25 miles.

“I was living in West Hollywood when I was stabled at Hollywood Park (which closed in December of 2013),” Powell said. “I have three daughters (Louise, 14, Blanche, 13 and Jeanne, 9) and they were going to a bilingual school that taught French and English.

“When I moved my barn to Santa Anita, the kids were doing very well, so I decided to make the commute instead of them. I didn’t want them to change schools.

“Actually, my commute in the morning is easy, because at 4 o’clock, there’s not much traffic. I can make it in 25 minutes going with the traffic. In the evenings, when I’m against the traffic, it can take 45 minutes.”

Married to Mathilde—his sweetheart from their days at Caen University—all their children enjoy racing, particularly Jeanne who rides and spends time with her father at the track on weekends.

Of the 25 head Powell has in training, by far the most celebrated is an 11-year-old gelding named Soi Phet. The tassel-haired trainer was not suffering from insipience when he made the claim for $16,000 at Hollywood Park on May 23, 2013.

Since then, the California-bred son of Tizbud has achieved success of mythic proportions, and after a recent freshening, is expected to resume his racing career.

“I’m going to take my time with him,” Powell said, “but I would expect him to return to the races at some point.”

When Soi Phet posted a 47-1 upset winning Santa Anita’s $100,000 Crystal Water Stakes by a head at age 10 in 2018, he was believed to be the oldest horse ever to win an added money event at the storied track, which opened on Christmas Day, 1934.

The Crystal Water was his 58th career start.

“At the time I claimed him, he had all his conditions,” Powell explained. “He had only won a maiden 20, he was a non-winner of two (races), he was a Cal-bred; it was the spring of 2013, and the Del Mar meet was coming up with very generous purses.

“When I took him, it was because he had conditions left, and I felt I could move him up.”

Wow and double wow! Eight stakes wins and a million dollars in earnings later, Powell now looks like the Nostradamus of trainers.

When he has occasion to give a leg up and pre-race instructions to jockeys Brice Blanc, Julien Couton, Florent Geroux, Julien Leparoux and Flavien Prat, fellow Frenchmen all, the bilingual Powell does what comes naturally.

“If the owner of the horse is there,” Powell said, “I speak English so that he can understand. But if it’s only me and the rider, we speak French.”

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Alan Balch - Horsemanship 1a

Horsemanship 1a – by Alan F. Balch

Anyone who has witnessed the saga of racing at Santa Anita this winter needs no repeated recitation of the facts . . . to say that the sport as we have known it is jeopardized in California, and perhaps North America, is a gross understatement. It’s worth remembering that the very word—jeopardy—is derived from gaming; when a position in chess and other games is equally divided between winning and losing, there’s danger.

Just how endangered we are, only time will tell.

So, of course, The Jockey Club released “a major white paper.” But like all the other stakeholders, they couldn’t resist pointing at everyone else except themselves. Again we heard their self-serving, political, and self-destructive refrain that “race day” and other therapeutic medications are culprits for what ails us. They threw in unspecified “cheaters and abusers” for good measure, as though that’s the public face of racing we embrace! All this, despite the simple fact that in the same state, during the same months, with the same medication rules as at Santa Anita, with the same or worse weather, another track—under the same ownership—maintained its position as one of the safest courses in America. Doubtless it escaped The Jockey Club that the all-weather synthetic surface at Golden Gate Fields was a principal factor in differentiating the two tracks!

But it hadn’t escaped anyone knowledgeable in California that main track and turf maintenance at Santa Anita beginning in January, as well as management of the racing program itself, may have been seriously flawed. And that the inherent issues are far greater than any isolated, dramatic spike in serious injuries at one place.

Therefore, it’s now essential, especially for the sport’s leadership, to go back to the objective, unemotional truths of basic horsemanship—not self-defeating posturing—to try to see where we stand throughout the world.

From the beginning of horses in sport, which is to say at the beginning of recorded history, the objective was to breed and train a swifter, stronger, better horse. For all this innocent animal’s many gifts to humankind, whether in work, commerce, war, exploration, sport, art, pleasure, or otherwise, horsemanship must begin with breeding. Responsible, logical breeding.  

Racing simply demonstrated who could breed a better horse. Glory followed. And later, riches. Racing stock is the proof of breeding stock.

The Jockey Club’s principal purposes are to improve the Thoroughbred breed and protect its integrity. It’s the breed registry. It sets the standard for breeding. At least it should. But that’s where our problems really begin, because the Thoroughbred breed is based on genotype, not phenotype. The genotype is the set of genes a horse carries, and our breed registry protects “integrity” by taking elaborate steps to be sure that there are no stray non-Thoroughbred genes in our horses. The way things are going, we might well need some!

The phenotype, on the other hand, is all of a horse’s observable characteristics—its conformation, quality, substance, and soundness. Who is guarding or enhancing the conformation, quality, substance, and soundness of our Thoroughbreds? Apparently not the breed registry! The next “white paper” we need to see from The Jockey Club about “reform” needs to take a deep, honest look at best practices for breeding, foaling, nursery, and every medication or veterinary practice that gets a Thoroughbred sold, whether or not in the auction ring and beyond. Any breed registry that permits, tolerates or encourages the breeding of unsoundness to unsoundness is not breeding a better horse, that’s certain. Nor should the registry turn a blind eye to any cosmetic or medicinal practice that could possibly compromise substance or soundness.

If the registry will concentrate on the true integrity of the breed—its soundness—it won’t need to waste nearly so much breath on the conduct of others.

Those of us who grew up in non-racing horse sport all remember The Sportsman’s Charter. It proclaims that sport ceases when it becomes a business only, something done for what there is in it. “The exploitation of sport for profit alone kills the spirit and retains only the husk and semblance of the thing.”  I believe this is exactly what’s been overtaking racing (killing it) for decades now.

There’s a reason that Keeneland and Saratoga and Del Mar succeed and inspire: their profits are turned back into the sport. They race limited seasons of the highest quality. They don’t exist for return on investment, except for the sport itself. But The Jockey Club boasts of its “group of commercial, for-profit subsidiaries and commercial partnerships.” Presumably those profits should benefit the sport. Do they, if protection of live cover, stud fees, auction prices, unsound pedigrees, and bloodstock profiting are weakening the breed? Do they, if their own professional journalists are muzzled? Do they, if their contributions to the U.S. Congress are wasted on the fool’s errand of banishing Lasix?

The for-profit racing associations and affiliated entities, whether public companies or private, exert the most pressure to exploit our once-great sport financially, all in the name of return-on-investment.  Consider this: At around 20,000 Thoroughbred foals a year these days, the foal crop is about where it was in 1966. In that year, Santa Anita raced 11 weeks. California racing had no overlaps between northern and southern dates (except during the summer fair season). The majestic colossus that is Santa Anita was dark from April until Christmas.  

Now, with the same number of foals as 1966, California has year-around racing throughout the state— north and south simultaneously. Santa Anita by itself races about 32 weeks. Can that much racing possibly be in the best interests of horses and the sport?

The collision between those interests and unrestrained financial gain is palpable. All those of us who have turned a silent or blind eye to this, including me, cannot avoid our own blame for what has happened. We have not put the interest of the horse or the breed first, as basic horsemanship would teach us to do.

Speaking of which, there’s another trumpeting elephant in our midst: the whip.

All those of us who can still remember our first serious riding lessons know we were taught not to get on without a stick. Then came the hard part: how and when to use it. Over the thousands of years of horses serving humans, understandings and opinions about this have evolved, to be sure. The humane, sensible use of the stick is probably more debated than ever before.

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Profile: David Duggan

By Giles Anderson

Golden Gate Fields is one of North America’s fastest growing racetracks in terms of handle growth. But that’s only part of the story as Giles Anderson found out when he recently sat down with Golden Gate Fields General Manager and Vice President David Duggan.

GA: You’ve been at Golden Gate Fields now for nearly eighteen months, running the track since October 2017. The figures from your first winter/spring meet were up massively, and then the summer meet was up 29%. What have you done to achieve such staggering growth?

DD: We made a lot of changes. It became quite a fast-moving, changing environment. What we discovered was that we have a lot of people who've been here for many, many years, but there hadn't been any adrenaline shot given to the place for quite some time, so we did change it, but it wasn't necessarily all down to me. There was a lot of people involved in this, and I was keen to have a younger crew in the management of the facility. They're great at connecting and they understand what their friends and colleagues are thinking, and they tell me. I feel all the talk about getting the young people in, and we have an aging demographic that follows horse racing. The only way to connect with young people and the millennials, and all these different groups that people are putting together now, is to listen to young people and that's what we have.

We've spent a lot of time since I came here, both myself and Cynthia Sidle—my special operations manager in San Francisco. We speak to and go and shake hands and meet lots of different groups. We've made a very big effort in Chinatown because I obviously know the Asian market quite well. We take bus loads of them to come out here on a Saturday to see us. We've spent a lot of time with the LGBTQ community and we've had some very, very successful events with them as well and indeed the Hispanic population which is very, very big in the city. We have a specific Latin festival here in the summer which is very, very well patronized as well.

What we've discovered is we can sit and hope people are going to come. In the greater majority of time, we've actually had to go out and get the people and bring them here. There's so much talk that the world of horse racing has become very, very small through various means, but there's so much talk about attracting younger people, getting younger people to come to the races. That's all very well, but you've got to be proactive and you have to do something about it.

If you make the effort to get people and bring them to the racetrack, they will come back.

But was the handle growth mainly off track—is that where the growth was coming from?

We worked hard with the racing office to increase the field size, therefore a lot of eyes around the country were on us. We also paid particular attention to the post times because on a weekend in particular, it can become quite a congested program because you have action on the East Coast, you have action on the West Coast, and you have action in Florida. It's very important to keep an eye on when everybody's coming out of the starting gate. We're very keen, and we watch them very carefully and we get a lot of help. If we need to move or wait a couple of minutes until somebody finishes, that's what we did.

When we looked at the figures, it was evident that we were clashing with bigger meetings; it was the “clash of the Titans” really. We were going off at the same time as Saratoga or Keeneland or Belmont, and we were going to lose every time. It was like a heavyweight mismatched boxing match.

We had to adjust that and that was a big help, but export was great and amazingly enough of our own track figure—people betting on us, on the facility, etc. was very good too with the increased attendance, but our figures across the board were good.

What's your average field size been?

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Our average field size has jumped. I think we're about a 7.2 and we're heading in the direction of 7.4 at the moment. That's a big, big jump from early sizes (late 5’s).

You’re in a unique position having the only artificial surface on the west coast. That must be a big strength for you?

Although we've got lots of different artificial surfaces worldwide, the Tapeta track is sensational. We've got a beautiful, beautiful turf track here. It's very mature and it really is tremendous. In fact Tom Queally, who was Sir Henry Cecil's jockey, was here for a season last year, and he said it rode as good a turf track as any.

When we do have to come off the turf, when we have heavy rain and we go onto the Tapeta, it's a very seamless transition and we get very few scratches. It takes the weather really well. It really is a great all-weather surface. I know Tapeta and Michael Dickinson won't thank me for saying all-weather, but it is Tapeta surface; but it's extremely durable, very kind and it's got a great cushion on it. The equine injuries are way, way down and there's very little attrition off it. It's really a wonderful surface.

The horsemen love it. It's great to train on and it's very durable. I think that's the key. There's a lot of horses out there in the morning. It's very easy to maintain as well. Once you follow the guidelines as set out by the manufacturers, it really is terrific.

What's your stabling capacity?

Well, we can hold something in the region of 1,400 horses. I think we've got 1,350 odd at the moment, so we're very, very full. A lot of that credit goes to Patrick Mackey and his racing team down there. Patrick and I went out and we went to the East Coast. We went to tracks that would have similar surfaces to us, and we got some trainers to come here from there.

It's not as easy. We haven't got a great pool of horses around us so we have to go and get them, but we're very full at the moment. We've also got some excellent trainers.

Last summer, the Northern California off track wagering deal was seemingly threatening the future structure of racing in this part of the state. Has any progress been made?

Very often in California it's a place of political influence, and sentiment outweighs economic reality, which in itself is puzzling, but that's California. It's a very different state. It's a very heavily regulated state, and that transcends down to horse racing as well and the administration of horse racing.

Tim Ritvo is very keen to provide a better grounding for our trainers with regards to what they get back and the purse money gets back. That's an ongoing situation at the moment and that'll continue to play out, I would imagine, well into 2019.

We'd love to be year round. We always put in our application for as many dates as we can possibly have. It's a shame in many respects that we don't race in the summer because we've got such a fabulous turf track that holds its moisture so well; and we'd love to be racing on the turf, but we don't for the greater part of June and July, and we start back in August. It's regrettable but it is the way it is. Hopefully one day the time will come when we can race in the summer.

Where do you see the role of the fair meets?

I think the fairs are part of the fabric of Californian society and there's no denying that. Whether they continue to exist in the current format, it will be interesting to see how that plays out. But they've been here a lot longer than me, and they probably will continue to be here a lot longer than me. We do our very best to accommodate them. The majority of the horses that are stabled at Golden Gate Fields race indeed at the fairs. I think there will come a time where perhaps economic reality will outweigh political sentiment. It's important to recognize at the very least that they are part of the fabric of our society in California.

Looking ahead for the coming year, what are your aspirations for the track?…

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Val Brinkerhoff - the former jockey turned trainer

By Ed Golden

The Santa Anita stable notes for April 14th (as written by Ed Golden) succinctly summarize that Val Brinkerhoff is one of the faceless trainers who drives the game.

He might be light years from being in a league with the Bafferts, Browns, and Pletchers but pound for pound, the 62-year-old Brinkerhoff has one of the most industrious operations in the land, flying beneath the radar while gaining respect from peers and bettors alike.

He’s an angular version of John Wayne, cowboy hat and all, but without the girth and swagger, Brinkerhoff is a hands-on horseman from dawn till dusk.

He is a former jockey who gallops his own horses, be they at Santa Anita, Del Mar, Turf Paradise in Arizona, or his training center in St. George, Utah, where he breaks babies and legs up older horses that have been turned out.

In short, Val Brinkerhoff is a man’s man, pilgrim.

It all began when he was 14 in a dot on the map called Fillmore, Utah, current population circa 2,500.

Named for the 13th President of the United States, Millard Fillmore, it was the capital of Utah from 1851 to 1856. The original Utah Territorial Statehouse building still stands in the central part of the state, 148 miles south of Salt Lake City and 162 miles north of St. George.

But enough of history.

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“My dad trained about 30 horses when we lived in Fillmore,” said Brinkerhoff, a third-generation horseman. “I would ride a pony up and down a dirt road outside our house every day, and that’s how I learned to gallop horses.

“There was no veterinarian in Fillmore, so you had to learn how to be a vet on your own, on top of everything else, because it was 300 miles round trip to a vet. So, if something was wrong, you had to figure it out for yourself without having to run to Salt Lake and back every five minutes.

“I was 5’ 10’’ and weighed 118 pounds and rode at the smaller venues, mainly in Utah but also Montana, where I was leading rider, and Wyoming and California (Fairplex Park in Pomona). I’ll never forget the day my dad took me to Pomona. I walked in the jocks’ room and immediately became aware of how tall I was.

“While in California, Bill Shoemaker gave me one of his whips, which I cherished. I rode many winners with it. Towards the end of my father’s life, my son, Ryan, asked him if he had any regrets. He said he had one.”

His father said, “I should have taken Val to the big tracks in California and given him the chance to make it there. He had the desire and the talent.”

Brinkerhoff also rode in Utah at outposts with names that sound contrived, like Beaver, Richfield, Marysvale, Kanab, Parowan, Ferron, Payson, and Panguitch.

“But ultimately,” he said, “I couldn’t make the weight. I was already skinny and at 5-10 and 118 pounds, didn’t have an ounce to lose.

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Bob Hess Jr - keeping the Hess name in the Winner's Circle

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Where went the marketing?

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THIS ARTICLE FIRST APPEARED IN - NORTH AMERICAN TRAINER - ISSUE 27