At MyRacehorse, we have assembled a team of some of the best trainers across North America, including 7 Hall of Famers.
Learn more about our current MRH Trainers below.

hall of fame trainers

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Steve Asmussen, North America’s winningest trainer and a member of racing’s Hall of Fame, was destined for greatness while growing up in Texas. With his parents Keith and Marilyn–both trainers themselves–and older brother Cash, a champion jockey in the U.S. and France, Asmussen naturally followed in their footsteps and is now one of the world’s most successful trainers. 

 

He first plied his trade as a jockey, but soon became too heavy and tall for that vocation. After turning to training, Asmussen won his first race in 1986 at Ruidoso Downs in New Mexico. Soon bigger tracks beckoned and it wasn’t long before he was making headlines in the big leagues. 

 

The two-time Eclipse Award-winning trainer guided Curlin to two Horse of the Year titles and wins in the Breeders’ Cup Classic and Dubai World Cup. Gun Runner, another standout in Asmussen’s care, was also a Horse of the Year and a winner of the Breeders’ Cup Classic. 

 

The breadth of his operation is quite impressive, with divisions at numerous racetracks across the U.S. and a multitude of training titles on his resume.

 

Outstanding MyRacehorse Runners: CHASING TIME 

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Widely recognized as one of the most successful trainers in the history of horse racing, Bob Baffert became a full-time Thoroughbred trainer after rising to the top of Quarter Horse racing. And it certainly did not take him long to also reach the pinnacle of his profession on the Thoroughbred side.

 

Through the years, Bob Baffert has registered numerous major stakes victories–including with MyRacehorse’s own 2020 Kentucky Derby winner and Horse of the Year Authentic–and has earned a multitude of awards, receiving accolades galore, all stemming from his drive to succeed and his knack of being able to elicit the very best that an equine athlete has to give. In 2009, that all culminated when he was inducted into Thoroughbred racing’s national Hall of Fame at Saratoga.

 

Bob Baffert has “an uncannily sharp eye for horseflesh,” multiple Eclipse Award-winning writer William Nack pointed out in a story about Baffert in GQ magazine. Nobody has “more manifest gifts as a horse whisperer” than Baffert, Nack added.

 

Outstanding MyRacehorse Runners: AUTHENTIC

 

Source: BobBaffert.com

 

Trainer Page Assets-39

Inducted into America’s’s Hall of Fame in 2020 and its Canadian counterpart four years earlier, Mark Casse was born in 1961 into a racing family. His father, Norman Casse, was involved in a multitude of positions in the sport — trainer, breeder, farm manager, and co-founder of the Ocala Breeders’ Sales Co. When he was just 18 years old, Casse saddled his first winner as a trainer.

 

He was the leading trainer at Woodbine in 2002 and many more titles would follow. He received three consecutive Sovereign Awards as Canada’s outstanding trainer from 2006 through 2008, and then nine more from 2011-19. But Casse’s success has not been limited to North of the Border by any means and he’s a regular and formidable presence at major racetracks in the United States. 

 

In 2019, Casse celebrated his first win in an American Triple Crown event when War of Will won the Preakness Stakes and then picked up his second victory, just three weeks later, when Sir Winston won the Belmont Stakes. Casse also owns five individual wins in Breeders’ Cup races, including the Breeders’ Cup Mile with the great turf mare Tepin, who was also a two-time Eclipse Award winner for the trainer. Other Eclipse Award winners trained by Casse include Shamrock Rose and Classic Empire. In addition to his induction into the Hall of Fame in Saratoga Springs, NY in 2020, Casse reached an important milestone that year when he saddled his 3,000th career winner. He now boasts more than 3700 victories and counting. 

 

Outstanding MyRacehorse Runners: GOT STORMY

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A  Hall of Famer who really needs no introduction–yet deserves all the accolades he receives–D. Wayne Lukas is a former champion Quarter Horse trainer that has been at the forefront of American Thoroughbred racing now for several decades and is still plying his trade at the highest level, while well into his 80s.

 

A horseman who is known for producing excellent pupils that leave his barn to put themselves on the map, including fellow Hall of Famer Todd Pletcher, Lukas-trained runners have earned more than an astonishing $295 million in purses.

 

Lukas is known for his approachability and gracious manner in his interactions with racing fans and frequently invites young children and teenagers he sees on the way to the winner’s circle to join him in the spirit of fostering future participation in racing.

 

Outstanding MyRacehorse Runners: SEIZE THE GREY
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A member of racing’s Hall of Fame since 2001, trainer Richard Mandella’s career has been nothing short of fabulous.

 

The son of a blacksmith, Mandella’s fascination with horses developed at an early age and while still in high school he began working at a ranch near his home in Southern California. In his early 20s, Mandella transitioned to jobs on the racetrack and before long established his own public stable on the SoCal racing circuit in 1976.

 

His name is now synonymous with California racing as it is there where many of his biggest wins have taken place. Stars such as Beholder, Pleasantly Perfect, Rock Hard Ten, and The Tin Man, to name but a few, cemented Mandella’s impeccable reputation as an elite horseman who is known for delving into the minds of his trainees as best he can to bring them to their full potential.

 

Mandella has won nine Breeders’ Cup races and holds the amazing distinction of winning four on a single card at his home base of Santa Anita Park when Action This Day, Halfbridled, Johar and Pleasantly Perfect each won their respective races at the World Championships in 2003.

 

Mandella also saddled a Grade 1 winner on the world’s stage: Pleasantly Perfect, who took down the 2004 Dubai World Cup.

 

 

Outstanding MyRacehorse Runners: LANE WAY, FORBIDDEN KINGDOM, MOONLIGHT D’ORO 

Trainer Page Assets-33

A member of Racing’s Hall of Fame since 1998, Bill Mott is one of the most revered horsemen in the world. Known for his hands-on approach — he quite frequently can be found in his horses’ stalls checking their legs and making sure they are bedded down correctly — Mott had been winning races long before the incomparable Cigar entered his barn, but it was that horse who gained the native of South Dakota some very serious global recognition. Cigar arrived in Mott’s New York barn in 1994, after an ordinary start the year prior in California. Cigar’s new trainer took his time with the horse, who responded by becoming one of racing’s all-time greats, due to his 16-race winning streak that saw Mott take him on the road to multiple racetracks in the U.S. and aboard, where he won the inaugural running of the $5-million Dubai World Cup in 1996. 

 

Cigar is but one of many accomplished racehorses who have flourished under Mott’s care. He has saddled the winners of 15 Breeders’ Cup races; among them Theatrical, a master on the turf and the 1987 champion grass horse. One of Mott’s best fillies, Royal Delta, was a standout during her racing career and was enshrined in racing’s Hall of Fame in 2019 following her winning three Eclipse Awards and earning more than $4.8 million on the racetrack. He also campaigned fan favorite Cody’s Wish to back-to-back G1 Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile victories in 2022 and 2023, the latter of which capped a Horse of the Year campaign. 

 

He and his wife, Tina, have three grown children, including son Riley, who is a up-and-coming and successful trainer in his own right. 

Trainer Page Assets-32

Todd Pletcher’s name has become synonymous with racing in the United States. The former protegé of legendary trainer D. Wayne Lukas joined his former boss in racing’s Hall of Fame in 2021.

 

Pletcher, a seven-time Eclipse Award-winning trainer, received his early lessons from his father, trainer Jake “J.J.” Pletcher while growing up in Texas. J.J. now operates Payton Training Center in Ocala, FL, where many of his only son’s horses receive their early lessons before reaching the racetrack.

 

A two-time Kentucky Derby-winning trainer (Always Dreaming and Super Saver), Pletcher–who won his first race as a trainer in 1996–has dominated East Coast racing through his excellent work with a bevy of elite racehorses. Among them, Rags to Riches, a 3-year-old who became the first filly to win the Belmont Stakes since 1905 when she defeated the mighty Curlin in the 2007 running of the third jewel of the Triple Crown.

 

Through 2023 he’s won 14 Breeders’ Cup races, and many of those winners, including Speightstown and Uncle Mo, have gone on to distinguished careers in the breeding shed, an achievement that has given Pletcher the moniker of being a “stallion-maker.” The eight-time winner of the Eclipse Award for Outstanding Trainer was represented in 2023 by leading juvenile male Fierceness.  

 

Outstanding MyRacehorse Runners: A MO REAY, PROVOCATEUR

Mrh stable trainers

Jena Antonucci got her start in racing working under the D. Wayne Lukas program at Padua Stables, breaking and training Thoroughbreds. The knowledge she gained there allowed her to evolve her training skillset and further apply it to the off-the-track training program at the farm. 

 

She then went on to work as an equine veterinary assistant, giving her valuable insight into another perspective on horses and their health. 

 

After starting her own business, Bella Inizio Farm, where she initially cared for broodmares, foals, weanlings, and yearlings, she eventually transitioned into rehabilitating Thoroughbreds to return to racing. 

 

What she is perhaps best known for is being the first female trainer to win a Triple Crown race when Archangelo crossed the finish line victorious in 2023’s Belmont Stakes. 

 

In addition to managing her own racing stable, Antonucci co-operates a large farm operation based at GoldMark Farm in Ocala, FL, where she and business partner Katie Miranda provide a wide range of equine services from boarding mares and foaling to pinhooking and training. 

Source: jenaantonucci.com

Born in Manitoba, Canada in 1984, Rob Atras began training in 2009. He won his first race on June 13, 2009 at Assiniboia Downs, near Winnipeg. 

 

Atras enjoyed success in Canada for several years before winning his first American stakes race at Turf Paradise in 2013, when he sent Flexiplus to victory in the Hasta La Vista Handicap; and later moved to the United States full time, working as an assistant trainer to Robertino Diodoro for several years. 

 

In 2019, Atras went back out on his own, and won his first stakes race in New York later that year with Royal Albert Hall in the Bernardini S. 

 

Atras earned a pair of major career milestones in 2021. That January, he took his first graded stakes race when American Power won the G3 Toboggan Stakes at Aqueduct. Later that summer at Saratoga, he won his first Grade 1 race when Maracuja pulled the upset in the prestigious Coaching Club American Oaks, defeating Kentucky Oaks winner Malathaat. 

 

Source: America’s Best Racing

One of the fresher faces on the Southern California racing scene, Dan Blacker, a native of United Kingdom and the son of a world-renowned equine sculptor, Philip Blacker, attended the University of Edinburgh. While at university, he and two buddies went to the nearby training yard of Peter Monteith and would ride horses before classes and it is there where his love for horses took on real energy.

 

His early education on the racetrack was gleaned through studies as a pupil working in the barn of Hall of Famer Richard Mandella, just one of several trainers he worked under. Blacker reached an important milestone in 2021 when he saddled his first career Grade 1 winner by capturing the Frank E. Kilroe Mile with Hit the Road at Santa Anita. What was particularly satisfying about the success of Hit the Road is that Blacker was involved in his purchase as a yearling at Keeneland.

  

Blacker is married to the former Christina Olivares, who is an on-air host at TVG and shares co-hosting duties with Nick “Sarge” Hines for MyRacehorse’s exclusive monthly show, Wire to Wire. The couple have three young daughters.


Nature got in the way of Kelly Breen’s plans to be a jockey when he grew almost six inches the winter he turned 16. Breen went to work as an exercise rider and was an assistant to trainer Walter Reese by the time he was 18. 

 

The New Jersey native operated a small stable from 1992 to 1994, then worked as an assistant to Ben Perkins Sr. until Perkins retired in 2000. 

 

Back out on his own after that, Breen has been a successful trainer through the years, but, led by Belmont Stakes winner Ruler On Ice, he reached new heights and earned national attention in 2011. That same year, Breen trainee Pants On Fire won the G2 Louisiana Derby and was the second betting choice in the Kentucky Derby. 

 

Source: America’s Best Racing

Known as one of the top trainers in North America, Chad Brown has made a serious name for himself since forming his own stable in November 2007.

 

Born on Dec. 18, 1978 in Mechanicville, NY–a few towns south of Saratoga Race Course, which he visited with his family as a child, Brown worked with Standardbreds at Saratoga Raceway before studying Animal Science at Cornell University.

 

Following his graduation, Brown worked with Shug McGaughey and, in 2002, Bobby Frankel, the Hall of Fame trainer Brown cites as his mentor.

 

Brown has conditioned a multitude of Eclipse Award-winning horses, including 2019 Horse of the Year Bricks and Mortar. Brown himself won the Eclipse Award for top trainer four consecutive years, 2016-2019. He captured his first Triple Crown race with Cloud Computing in the 2017 Preakness Stakes and won the race again in 2022 with Early Voting. Boasting 16 Breeders’ Cup trophies, Brown is perhaps best known for his prowess with turf horses and particularly fillies, and is frequently seen running 1-2 or 1-2-3 in graded stakes on the grass. 

 

A mainstay in Canada for decades, trainer Josie Carroll was inducted into the Canadian Hall of Fame in 2019, the first female to be bestowed with that honor.

 

Without any family ties to horse racing, Carroll became fascinated on her own by horses well before she reached her teens. Later, with a desire to be around horses still burning strong, Carroll enrolled in an equine program at a college near Woodbine and from there found her way to the racetrack.

 

Known around the backstretch for her hard-working ways, Carroll has made her mark on Canada’s most prestigious race, the Queen’s Plate, by becoming the first woman to win the race in 2006 with Edenwold. She followed with two more Plate victories, with Inglorious in 2011 and Mighty Heart in 2020.

 

South of the border, Carroll’s biggest victory came in 2009 at Saratoga Race Course with Careless in the prestigious G1 Alabama S. In 2017, she came tantalizingly close to winning her first Breeders’ Cup race with Ami’s Mesa, who was defeated a nose in the Filly & Mare Sprint.

 

A son of a renowned horse trainer in France, Christophe Clement has been a fierce competitor in North American racing since he began training on U.S. soil in 1991. 

 

Born in Paris and a married father of two, Clement apprenticed under the legendary Luca Cumani in Europe before going to work for Hall of Fame trainer Shug McGaughey in the U.S. Clement’s ascension to elite trainer was a rapid one. After taking out his trainer’s license in 1991 in New York, he quickly established himself as a top conditioner of high-level turf runners. But in the ensuing years, Clement proved his prowess also extended beyond the grass. Among his Grade 1 winners on the dirt are 2014 Belmont Stakes winner Tonalist; and Funny Moon, winner of the 2009 Coaching Club American Oaks. Among the bevy of Grade 1 winners trained by Clement, who has saddled the winners of more than 200 graded races, is Gio Ponti, a three-time Eclipse Award champion who earned $6 million during his racing career. 

 

Clement won his first Breeders’ Cup race in 2021 with Pizza Bianca, owned by celebrity chef Bobby Flay, in the Juvenile Fillies Turf.

 

 

 

Brad Cox’s rise to prominence as an elite trainer has been nothing short of remarkable. The native of Louisville, KY accompanied his father to Churchill Downs as a youngster and instantly fell in love with the racing scene. While still a teenager, Cox took his first job on the racetrack as a hotwalker and later would spend five years in the employ of trainer Dallas Stewart before opening his own public stable when he was 24.

 

His early years as a trainer found him working predominantly with claimers, but in recent years his racing stock has risen dramatically and featured champions Knicks Go, Monomoy Girl, Covfefe and Essential Quality. In 2021, Essential Quality gave the trainer his first Classic win in the Belmont Stakes. The Cox-trained Mandaloun, who finished second in that year’s Kentucky Derby, would later be elevated to the win when Medina Spirit was disqualified. Since 2018, Cox has saddled the winners of nine Breeders’ Cup races including two with the brilliant Monomoy Girl. All of that success led Cox to the coveted Eclipse Award title of the country’s top trainer in 2020 and 2021.

 

Philip D’Amato started his Thoroughbred racing career in Kentucky and after several years moved home to Southern California under the tutelage of the late master Mike Mitchell. After 10 years with Mitchell, D’Amato took over the barn when Mitchell retired in 2014. 

 

D’Amato hit the ground running, winning more than 80 races including Grade 1 wins with Obviously and Street Fancy in his first year on his own. In 2016, he saddled his first Breeders’ Cup winner, Obviously, to a victory in the Turf Sprint, and has been represented by a number of other highest-level winners such as Midnight Storm, Bowies Hero, Gold Phoenix, Going Global, Count Again, Hunt, Ransom the Moon and 2024 Santa Anita Derby hero Stronghold. 

 

D’Amato is known for his Midas touch with turf horses and European imports in particular, and is also considered a very savvy player at the claim box, where he has been successful in turning claimers into stakes winners.

 

Mark Glatt, a second-generation horseman, was destined to train Thoroughbreds. The son of now-retired trainer Ron Glatt, the younger Glatt grew up on a farm in Auburn, WA, and by the time he entered high school he knew that he wanted to follow in his father’s footsteps.

 

Glatt began training in 1994, overseeing his father’s second string at Yakima Meadows in Washington State while his father brought a string to Southern California. The following year the younger Glatt traveled to Northern California with a small stable he raced at Golden Gate Fields. It was there that Glatt began training horses for Bill and Linear Bannasch, who provided him with the opportunity in 2000 to migrate to the big league tracks on the Southern California circuit, where Glatt has been a steady and reliable presence ever since.

 

Among the stakes winners trained by Glatt are his first Grade 1 winner, Collusion Illusion; multiple Grade 1-winning sprinter and young sire Dr. Schivel; and Sharp Samurai, a millionaire on the racetrack

 

Glatt has solidified himself as one of the top conditioners on the SoCal circuit in recent years, and celebrated a banner year in 2023 with nearly $5 million in earnings. He has not slowed down at all in the first half of 2024, winning at a 25% clip through mid-May. 

 

Kenny McPeek has carved out a niche for himself in the Thoroughbred industry as not only a top-class trainer, but also an astute judge of young horses. His keen eye has played a pivotal role in selecting some very accomplished horses for his clients without breaking the bank. Of those successes is two-time Horse of the Year Curlin, who McPeek selected as a yearling for just $57,000 while on a brief hiatus from training. The two-time Horse of the Year would go on to earn in excess of $10 million. Other home runs for McPeek include Noble’s Promise, a Grade 1-winning millionaire who he recommended the purchase of for $10,000 when the horse was just a weanling. His leading earner as a trainer, Take Charge Lady, an 11-time winner of $2.4 million, was purchased by the trainer for $175,000 as a yearling.

 

McPeek exceptional eye for value was further on display in 2024 when $40,000 yearling acquisition Thorpedo Anna dominated the G1 Kentucky Oaks. One day later he would earn his first G1 Kentucky Derby victory with Mystick Dan. 

 

His other Triple Crown winners are the filly Swiss Skydiver, winner of the 2020 Preakness  (also a $35,000 yearling to $4.7-million seller at the conclusion of her career); and Sarava, who upended the 2002 Belmont S. at 70-1. 

 

McPeek’s knowledge of the bloodstock industry also spans the globe as he is a frequent participant for his clients at auction houses in South America and Europe and is not one to shy away from shipping overseas.  

 

Saffie Joseph Jr. made his way to South Florida from Barbados with two horses in 2011. Since then, he has been a model of consistency winning at 22% over the course of his career.

 

Joseph comes from a family of horsemen following in the footsteps of his grandfather (owner) and father (trainer) as a third-generation horseman. He was no stranger to success even at the young age of 22, winning the Barbados Triple Crown with Areutalkintome. His first graded stakes win in America came in a big way when his colt Math Wizard scored a major upset in the Grade 1, $1 million Pennsylvania Derby in 2019.

 

Among his top earners are Grade 1 winners Drain the Clock and White Abarrio as well as nearly $2.3-million earner Skippylongstocking. 

 

Born in England, Tom Morley comes from a family extensively involved with horses, including his father, who was an owner and a breeder, and an uncle who was a Grade 1-winning trainer. 

 

Tom is a graduate of the prestigious Darley Flying Start program, an equine management program which affords its students the opportunity for hands-on learning while traveling the world to experience racing on a global scale. Morley’s education was further bolstered by working with many renowned horsemen, here and abroad, including Ed Dunlop, Jeremey Noseda and Eddie Kenneally. 

 

In 2013, Morley opened his own stable in New York and is recognized on the New York Racing Association circuit as a hard-working and successful horseman. He has saddled two Grade 1 winners, New York-bred Haveyougoneaway, the winner of the Ballerina Stakes at Saratoga Race Course; and Carrick, the winner of the Secretariat Stakes at Arlington Park. 

 

Morley is married to respected NYRA television analyst and reporter, Maggie Wolfendale, who assists her husband in the barn. They have two young children.

 

Doug O’Neill is a two-time Kentucky Derby-winning trainer who is consistently one of the leading conditioners in America. Through mid-2024, O’Neill’s stable has won more than 2,880 races and earned more than $162 million in purses. 

 

O’Neill’s standouts include Derby winner I’ll Have Another (2012) and Nyquist (2016); two-time Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile champion Goldencents; and Lava Man, a former $50,000 claimer turned $5-million earner. 

 

O’Neill is a native of Michigan and resides with his family in Santa Monica, California. His brother, Dennis O’Neill, is a prominent bloodstock agent who has selected many of the stable’s most successful horses as 2-year-olds at auction, including I’ll Have Another, Nyquist and Goldencents.

 

Kent Sweezey is a top-class and up-and-coming horseman, whose family lineage and professional resumé strongly point to a very successful career ahead for him. He grew up at the legendary Kentucky breeding farm Darby Dan, where his father was general manager, and worked alongside him in all areas of the operation. 

 

Later Sweezey helped his parents launch Timber Town Stable, a renowned full-service breeding operation in Kentucky, before leaving to pursue his own interests in the industry by working in the barns of top horsemen including Christophe Clement and Jimmy Jerkens. 

 

Sweezey began training on his own in 2017, and it wasn’t long before he notched his first graded stakes win with Phat Man in the G3 Fred W. Hooper at Gulfstream Park in 2020. Over the last few years, he has steadily grown his stable to the point that in 2021 he generated purse earnings of $2.3 million, a career-best to date.

 

Brendan Walsh, a former assistant to Eddie Kenneally, picked up his first win as a trainer in 2012. The Irishman notched his first graded stakes win in 2014 and in the ensuing seasons has solidified himself as one of the top trainers in Northern America. 

 

In 2019 Walsh sent Derby hopeful Plus Que Parfait to Dubai to compete in the UAE Derby, and the ridgling responded willingly to win the $2.5-million race and earn a place in the Kentucky Derby starting gate.

 

One of several trainers for the global powerhouse Godolphin Stable, Walsh earned his first Grade 1 win when Godolphin homebred Maxfield won the 2019 Claiborne Breeders’ Futurity. Maxfield added a second Grade 1 win in 2021, when Walsh set new career highs for wins with 81. The following year, Walsh set a new personal best in purse earnings with more than $8.6 million while winning three Grade 1 races. 

 

Walsh added a marquee win in May 2023 when he sent out Godolphin’s Pretty Mischievous to a victory in the $1.25-million Kentucky Oaks, his first win in the most important U.S. race for 3-year-old fillies.

 

Source: America’s Best Racing

Wesley Ward, the son of Washington trainer Dennis Ward and grandson of New York outrider Jim Dailey, took out his trainer’s license in 1991 after ending a successful career as a jockey. His time in the saddle included an Eclipse Award as outstanding apprentice in 1984. Ward’s first career stakes win and graded stakes win as a trainer came with Unfinished Nymph in the 1994 Will Rogers Handicap.

 

In 2009, Ward made history when on his first trip to England he became the first American trainer to win at Royal Ascot. He won the Norfolk Stakes with No Nay Never before shipping the 2-year-old colt back to Europe for the G1 Prix Morny, a race he also won.

 

In 2014, Ward again won at Royal Ascot with Hootenanny. Hootenanny went on to win the 2014 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf, one of the highlights of Ward’s results at the event. He also won the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint with Judy the Beauty, finished second in the Juvenile Turf with Pick of the Litter, second in the Juvenile Fillies Turf with Sunset Glow, and also finished second and third with No Nay Never and Undrafted in the Turf Sprint. Overall, Ward sent six horses to the Breeders’ Cup that with none of them finishing worse than third. Judy the Beauty was later named Eclipse champion female sprinter for 2014.

 

In 2019 and 2020, Ward picked up two more Breeders’ Cup wins in the Juvenile Turf Sprint, scoring with Four Wheel Drive in 2019 and then Golden Pal in 2020. And a year later, Ward tallied his third consecutive win in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf Sprint (and fifth Breeders’ Cup win overall) as his charge Twilight Gleaming, who entered the race off of a runner-up finish and a win in Europe, led gate to wire at Del Mar on Nov. 5, 2021. Ward-trained Kaufymaker finished third in the race.

 

Ward kept up the momentum at the 2021 World Championships by taking the Turf Sprint on Nov. 6 with Golden Pal, the 2020 Juvenile Turf Sprint winner.

 

Ward owns 10 training titles at prestigious Keeneland, including seven at its Spring Meet, where is known for unveiling a bevy of precocious and speedy juveniles each year. 

 

Source: America’s Best Racing

A Louisville, KY native, George Weaver started out as a hot walker for trainer Mark Hennig. He took out his trainer’s license in 2002 after working as an assistant to Hall of Famer D. Wayne Lukas and Todd Pletcher.

 

Weaver earned his first Grade 1 win in 2013 when Lighthouse Bay won the Prioress Stakes. Other top horses trained by Weaver include Isotherm, Falling Sky and Saratoga County.

 

In 2019, Weaver-trained Vekoma earned a berth into the Kentucky Derby with a win in the Toyota Blue Grass Stakes. Vekoma would go on to take the prestigious G1 Carter and G1 Met Mile the following year, and is now a highly young sire with first runners in 2024. 

 

Source: America’s Best Racing