Breeders’ Cup Presents Connections: For Trainer Wyner, ‘This Is What I Was Born To Do; It’s In The Blood’

There's nothing quite like having a potential Derby horse in the barn, and 53-year-old trainer Harold Wyner knows he'll never go back to installing satellite television sets after saddling Capo Kane to win the Jan. 1 Jerome Stakes at Aqueduct.

“That was just a phase,” he said, a lilting English accent giving away the Manchester native's heritage. “I was kind of disheartened when I left, but eventually I missed getting on the horses and the thrill of it all. This is what I was born to do; it's in the blood.”

Wyner spent four years in Florida working as a “cable guy,” but by 2010 the horses were pulling him back to the sport he'd loved since childhood. In fact, Wyner left school early to work for a steeplechase trainer in England, learning to groom and ride the racehorses from the ground up, and even tried his hand as a jumps jockey.

Wyner earned a job with champion trainer Michael Dickinson in England, and followed the renowned conditioner to the United States in the late 1980s. Wyner spent a year working for Dickinson at Fair Hill Training Center in Maryland, then he and his new wife moved up to Delaware and became freelance exercise riders.

The jockey bug hadn't quite given up its hold on Wyner, though, and after whittling his weight down from 140 to 119 pounds, Wyner started riding flat races in the United States.

“I'll tell you, I wasn't very good at it,” Wyner said, laughing. “It just wasn't a good fit, because I was always too weak from reducing to keep my weight under control.”

After a three-year career spanning 14 wins from 462 starts, Wyner went back to exercise riding in 1992. He moved around a bit over the next dozen years, learning as much as he could from a number of different trainers including Sam Cronk, Terry Huiet, John Scanlon, Mark Hennig, and James Bond.

By 2004 Wyner was ready to step out on his own, and he launched his stable with two horses at Philadelphia Park. Unfortunately, things didn't take off the way he'd hoped; Wyner saddled just two winners that first year and four winners the second.

It just wasn't enough to make a living, so Wyner stepped away from the game to regroup. When he returned to Philadelphia in 2010, it was with a renewed drive and passion for the sport.

“You know, you have to be in the right place at the right time,” Wyner said. “I'm grateful to Mr. Ted Hoover, who gave me a shot then, and I made Philly my home base because I knew the people there and it felt like home.”

That right place, right time axiom may have felt disingenuous about this time last year. Wyner trained the talented Ny Traffic through his first four starts, then watched the colt achieve multiple graded stakes placings under the care of Saffie Joseph in 2020.

Wyner had helped co-owner John Fanelli select Ny Traffic at the 2019 Fasig-Tipton Midlantic 2-year-old sale, making a deal at the barn after the colt RNA'd at $27,000 in the ring.

“We decided to send him to Florida to Mr. Saffie and thank God we did because COVID hit,” said Wyner. “I told Mr. Fanelli [co-owner of NY Traffic] then that he was a Derby horse.”

Wyner cheered as Ny Traffic finished eighth in the delayed 2020 edition of the Kentucky Derby, but the blue collar trainer was already looking forward to another bargain purchase preparing for his first start.

Wyner (at right) in the winner's circle with Capo Kane after his win in the Jerome

At the same sale in 2020, Wyner watched as a big, good-looking son of Street Sense failed to make his reserve in the ring. He was the first foal out of the unplaced Hard Spun mare Twirl Me, though his dam's half-brother was a multiple stakes winner and his third dam was the millionaire Grade 1 winner Tuzla.

“He had great big size, this big shoulder and big hip, and he looked like the kind of horse that needed to grow into himself,” Wyner recalled. “He RNA'd at $26,000, and I told the owner we should go back and look at him to see if we could make a deal.”

Though the colt had cost $75,000 as yearling at the Keeneland September sale, COVID meant a buyer's market by the time he'd turned two. Wyner made a deal for $26,000 — just below the colt's reserve price of $30,000 — and was thrilled to bring him home.

“He always had a kind attitude,” the trainer said. “He showed a little talent in his breezes, staying head-to-head with everything we worked him with, and trying to get ahead of them at the finish. He has such a long stride; I'd seen it before with Mark (Hennig, in the early 2000s), how those good horses go, and he's one of them.”

Capo Kane was second on debut, but won easily by 4 ½ lengths in his second career start despite drifting out late.

“He was kind of a big baby, really green, but from that maiden win it was like the light bulb went on his head,” said Wyner. “Now, he's a little tougher to gallop.”

The trainer would know, as he rides the colt himself almost every day. Of his 24 head based at Parx, Wyner gallops seven to 10 horses each morning, rotating through the string so he sits on each horse at least a couple days each week.

“I train every horse a little bit different, and I can feel what is going on with them better than I can see it from the ground,” he explained. “I guess it's kind of a European style of training, with longer, slower gallops that finish up a little stronger from mid-way through the turn to the wire. That's where the races are won, after all.”

Capo Kane showed he'd been paying attention to his morning lessons in the Jerome, leading the field by just a half-length early on and pulling away in the stretch to win by a dominant 6 ¼ lengths over the muddy track.

“I really didn't know how to feel when he won,” Wyner said. “I had goosebumps, it was just so incredible. I was like a kid in a candy shop.”

Up next for Capo Kane should be the Feb. 6 Withers Stakes and then on to the Gotham and the Wood Memorial. He hopes to keep the colt close to home, on the New York Road to the Kentucky Derby, but is also willing to ship him around if a different schedule proves wise.

“We'll let the horse tell us what he wants to do,” Wyner said. “That's the thing with these guys; if you know how to listen, you never stop learning from them.”

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TVG’s Year In Review Special To Focus On Impact Of COVID-19 On Horse Industry

TVG will premiere a special feature on Saturday afternoon which will focus on the impact COVID-19 had on the global horse racing industry and the united efforts by TVG and the entire industry to continue to bring horse racing to fans. The award-winning network's coverage this weekend will also include two Kentucky Derby prep races – the $150,000 Jerome Stakes from Aqueduct on Friday and the $100,000 Sham Stakes (Grade 3) from Santa Anita on Saturday alongside stakes races from Gulfstream Park.

The 2020 retrospective will air at approximately 5:30 p.m. ET/2:30 p.m. PT on Saturday. To watch a one-minute preview, click here.

 The first Kentucky Derby prep race of the year will be held at Aqueduct on New Year's Day with the $150,000 Jerome Stakes for 3-year-old hopefuls going one mile. Swill, tabbed as the 7-5 morning favorite for trainer Brad Cox, will take on four rivals with jockey Kendrick Carmouche in the irons. The bay son of Munnings was last seen finishing fourth in the Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes (G2) at Churchill Downs. The Jerome Stakes offers 10-4-2-1 Kentucky Derby points to the top four finishers.

On Saturday, Todd Schrupp, Christina Blacker and Britney Eurton will be live on site at Santa Anita for a nine-race card featuring two graded stakes races – the $200,000 San Gabriel (G2) and the $100,000 Sham Stakes (G3). The Sham Stakes will feature a field of five newly minted 3-year-olds who will be competing for points towards a spot in the Kentucky Derby (G1) including two for trainer Bob Baffert – Medina Spirit and Life is Good. Baffert won this race in 2020 with Authentic who went on to win the Kentucky Derby (G1) and Breeders' Cup Classic (G1). The Sham Stakes (G3) offers 10-4-2-1 Kentucky Derby points to the top four finishers.

Gulfstream Park has an eleven-race card featuring five stakes races scheduled for Saturday. The featured tenth event, the $100,000 Mucho Macho Stakes, has drawn a field of ten 3-year-olds including graded stake winner Mutasaabeq for trainer Todd Pletcher and jockey Luis Saez. Owned by Shadwell Stable, the son of Into Mischief will switch back to dirt after a tenth-place finish in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf (G1).

In addition to opening weekend from Santa Anita, Aqueduct and Gulfstream Park, TVG will be featuring racing from Fair Grounds, Tampa Bay Downs and more. Fans can tune in on TVG, TVG2 and the Watch TVG app which is available on Amazon Fire, Roku and connected Apple TV devices.

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Unproven Life Is Good Tops Early Kentucky Derby Odds Ahead Of Likely Sham Start

With the Road to the Kentucky Derby completed until 2021, current standings at betonline.ag have the leader as 10-1 favorite Life Is Good followed by Essential Quality at12-1. While interesting, there are still 27 qualifying races left in the months between now and the first weekend in May.

The next Kentucky Derby Future Wager pool will take place Jan. 22 – Jan. 24.

Bob Baffert-trained Life Is Good is by leading sire Into Mischief, who also sired 2020 Kentucky Derby winner, Authentic. The unproven colt has only had one start in which he broke his maiden with a wire-to-wire win by 9 1/2 lengths. The 2-year-old set lively fractions of :21.80, :44.84, 1:09.08, and a final time of 1:15.50 for the 6 1/2 furlong maiden special weight at Del Mar on Nov. 22. He was ridden by two-time Kentucky Derby winner Mike Smith. Life Is Good is expected to make his next start in the G3 Sham Stakes at Santa Anita on Jan. 2, and finished at 5-1 in the first Kentucky Derby Future Wager pool.

Following closely behind on the 2021 Kentucky Derby Odds list is Breeder's Cup Juvenile and Grade 1 Claiborne Breeders' Futurity winner, Essential Quality. The son of Tapit is currently undefeated in three starts and is expected to make his next start sometime in February. Trained by Brad Cox and owned by Godolphin LLC, Essential Quality finished at 8-1 in the first Kentucky Derby Future Wager pool.

The entire 2021 Kentucky Derby Odds List, per betonline.ag, is as follows:

Life Is Good                              10/1

Essential Quality                       12/1

Keepmeinmind                          20/1

Prime Factor                             20/1

Jackie's Warrior                         25/1

Mandaloun                                25/1

Senor Buscador                        25/1

Spielberg                                  25/1

Highly Motivated                       28/1

Caddo River                              33/1

Classier                                    33/1

Greatest Honour                        33/1

Hot Rod Charlie                         33/1

Prate                                        33/1

Red Flag                                   33/1

Amount                                     50/1

Dr. Schivel                                50/1

Freedom Fighter                        50/1

Get Her Number                        50/1

Known Agenda                          50/1

Olympiad                                  50/1

Reinvestment Risk                    50/1

Savile Row                                50/1

Huntsinger                                66/1

Prisoner                                    66/1

Sittin On Go                              66/1

Team Merchants                       66/1

Founder                                    100/1

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Breeders’ Cup Presents Connections: ‘I Never Thought We’d Be Able To Go Twice’

When longtime family friend and Thoroughbred trainer Todd Fincher starts throwing around labels like “really special,” owner/breeder Joe Peacock, Jr. definitely starts to get his hopes up.

“That actually makes me more nervous,” said Peacock, 62, chuckling genially. “Todd doesn't generally talk about horses like that.”

Fincher was describing a 2-year-old colt who, at that point, had done little more than break his maiden over suspect company in a 5 ½-furlong contest at Remington Park. Third-generation Peacock homebred Senor Buscador missed the break in that race, rallied six wide and got up to win by 2 ½ lengths, but his final time of 1:03.78 wasn't particularly newsworthy.

However, the trainer's faith in the colt, and Peacock's returned faith in the trainer, convinced the owner to enter the colt in Remington's $200,000 Springboard Mile on Dec. 19. It was a massive step up, both in distance and in class, but Fincher remained confident.

“Todd told me, 'I won't guarantee you that he'll win this race,'” recalled Peacock. “Then he added, 'I will guarantee you that his talent's gonna shine through.' It certainly did!”

Senor Buscador missed the break once again and was 17 lengths behind the field early on, making his connections nervous from the start. The colt needed just 1:37.87 to change their minds, showing up with a powerful late rally to pass all nine of his rivals and win the one-mile contest by 5 ¾ lengths.

“If we can ever get him out of the gate, he'll be really dangerous,” Peacock quipped. “To do that in just his second lifetime start, though, that was pretty impressive.”

Compared to older horses racing earlier on the same card, Senor Buscador put up a quality time for the mile. Dont Tell Noobody, a 3-year-old Oklahoma-bred gelding, won the one-mile $70,000 Jim Thorpe Stakes in 1:39.50. Dipping In, a 3-year-old Oklahoma-bred filly, won the $70,000 Useeit Stakes at one mile in 1:40.69.

Unfortunately, Senor Buscador was not eligible for the 10 Kentucky Derby points usually offered to the race's winner. The 2-year-old son of Mineshaft raced on Lasix in the Springboard Mile, and the 2021 Road to the Kentucky Derby will not award points unless horses compete without the race-day medication.

Moving forward, that won't be a problem for Senor Buscador, Peacock said.

“(The Springboard Mile) was only his second lifetime start, and he's a late foal, born in May, stretching out from 5 ½ to a mile stakes,” Peacock explained. “Todd just felt like (running on Lasix) was the right thing to do just as a precaution, but obviously going forward on the Derby trail, we'll be running without it.

“We're not really worried about it.”

Should the colt's abilities prove just as eye-catching without Lasix, he will easily make the jump to most Kentucky Derby pundits' top ten lists as the 2021 season approaches. Fans and analysts will likely see Senor Buscador back in action at the Fair Grounds Race Course in New Orleans, La., possibly as early as the G3 Lecomte Stakes on Jan. 16.

The colt's name is loosely translated from Spanish to Mr. Prospector, the result of a family-wide contest to name the year's foals and a play on the fact that Mr. Prospector appears on both top and bottom of Senor Buscador's pedigree.

It marks the second time in the past three years that Peacock's family have had a horse on the Kentucky Derby trail. In 2018, Senor Buscador's half-brother Runaway Ghost won the G3 Sunland Derby to earn his spot in the starting gate on the first Saturday in May.

Their Derby dreams fell apart, however, when Runaway Ghost suffered a fractured shin and had to be given time off, missing the Run for the Roses.

Connections of Runaway Ghost celebrate in the winner's circle after the Sunland Derby

It had felt like a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, so the entire Peacock clan decided to take the trip to Louisville, Ky., anyway.

“We already had all the plans in place,” Peacock explained. “We took Friday and went over to Shawhan Place where the mares are, and then it rained all day long on Saturday, but we still had fun.

“You know, we really enjoy the whole process, from owning the broodmare, determining who you want to breed to, raising the foal, and then seeing it out on the racetrack. I know that's not the way people are in this business very much anymore, but we love every part of it.”

It was one of the last trips Peacock would take with his father, the family patriarch Joe Sr., who passed in September of this year at 88 years of age. It was the elder Peacock who first fell in love with racing in the 1960s, coordinating trips from the family's home in San Antonio, Tx., over to Ruidoso in New Mexico to watch Quarter Horses strut their stuff on the track.

“That's kind of the closest place in Texas you can go to get to the mountains, so that's where we ran the horses in the beginning,” Peacock explained. “Eventually he switched over to Thoroughbreds, and since it's hard to get open-company races to go in New Mexico, we started running them all over. We took trips to Santa Anita, to Hollywood Park; we went to the races a lot. It was a wonderful childhood.”

Peacock Sr. purchased the family's foundation broodmare, Snippet, by Alysheba, at the dispersal sale of family friend Joe Strauss in the late 1990s. An Illinois-bred out of a G3-winning daughter of Damascus, Snippet won four allowance races on the track and earned just shy of $70,000. Peacock sent her to California's Old English Rancho for a mating to multiple G1-winning millionaire Peaks and Valleys (Mt. Livermore).

Miss Glen Rose, the resultant Kentucky-bred filly, didn't do much on the track, but it was a different story altogether with her daughter, Rose's Desert.

Rose's Desert was foaled in New Mexico in 2008, sired by the unraced Desert God (Fappiano-Blush With Pride, by Blushing Groom). The filly showed such promise in her early days that Peacock Sr. turned to a new up-and-coming trainer when she was ready for the track.

Fincher was winning a large number of the New Mexico-bred stakes races, and Peacock Sr. called him up out of the blue to offer him the chance to train Rose's Desert.

“The rest, as they say, was history,” Peacock Jr. said fondly. “She turned into an amazing race mare, and we trust Todd implicitly with all our racehorses, from breaking them to running on the track.”

Rose's Desert raced 15 times, winning 10 and finishing second the other five times, and was never beaten more than 1 ¼ lengths. Seven of her wins came in state-bred stakes races, and she earned a total of $626,035.

“She was just such a cool horse to have in the barn,” Fincher said. “She's definitely my all-time favorite. She was just unbelievably fast.”

An ankle chip ended the mare's career prematurely in 2013, and the Peacock family decided to send her after the best stallions in Kentucky. Her first mating to Ghostzapper produced Runaway Ghost in 2015, a horse who may have missed his chance at the Kentucky Derby but earned $783,509 and won eight of 15 lifetime starts. He'll stand his first season at stud in 2021 at Double LL Farms in Bosque, N.M.

Rose's Desert visited Curlin next, producing stakes-winner Sheriff Brown, and then produced a filly by Ghostzapper named Our Iris Rose, after the family's matriarch. Our Iris Rose is still in training, and while she's had a couple minor issues along the way, Peacock Jr. expects she'll be able to live up to her family's talent as a 4-year-old in 2021.

Senor Buscador is sired by Mineshaft, and marks Rose's Desert's third stakes winner from four foals on the ground. The mare took a year off from the breeding shed in 2018, then aborted a filly by Quality Road last December due to placentitis. Currently she's carrying a filly by Candy Ride due in February, and Peacock said he has no set plans for the 12-year-old mare's future.

Of course, should Senor Buscador continue to progress along the Kentucky Derby trail, a return visit to Mineshift could be on the horizon.

“It's a good problem to have, but we definitely haven't decided anything,” Peacock said. “We're just so grateful to her… I ought to take her some roses the next time I see her.”

Senor Buscador is listed as bred by both Peacock and his father, so his Friday night victory in the Springboard Mile was that much more special. The entire family, including Peacock's two sisters, his mother, five children, and six grandchildren will try to attend the colt's next start, whether it be in New Orleans or elsewhere, and cheer him all the way to Louisville.

“I guess nobody really knows what to expect, with everything this year,” Peacock said. “It would be incredible to take this horse to the Kentucky Derby. I never thought we'd be able to go twice.”

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