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Breeders’ Cup Presents Connections: Wente’s Patience, Vision As A Breeder Is Paying Off

Fresh out of high school and with no clear career path in mind, Tommy Wente wasn't exactly sure where his life was headed. But that would change when he paid a visit to his stepdad, Thoroughbred trainer Tom Hickman, and caught a glimpse of what he was keeping in his barn.

“He (Hickman) was a trainer for years and he had a house in Indiana so when my mom moved to Indiana with him, I would go visit,” he said. “He kept all his racehorses in his barn and when I saw the first one, I was hooked. I just knew, 'I have to have one of these.' And the rest is history.”

More than 20 years later and Wente is on the precipice of one of the best seasons of his life as a breeder. His farm, St. Simon Place, recently produced stakes winner Hidden Connection (by Connect), who took the Grade 3 Pocahontas Stakes on Sept. 18 at Churchill Downs. The filly, along with several others already making an impression on the track, could send Wente and his partners to the Breeders' Cup World Championships with a roster that many Thoroughbred breeders never achieve.

But back in 1999 when Wente made his first foray into racing, the idea of the World Championships — or any graded stakes race for that matter — seemed a world away from his reality.

“My stepdad was a trainer and he got me my first horse,” said Wente. “I actually ended up losing that horse in a fire at a Quarter Horse track in Henderson, Ky. So that didn't go very well. But I stayed in the business, and I started off in the Indiana-bred program because that's where I'm from. I started at the bottom with no money, and we were foaling a lot of junk, but I thought it was the best thing in the world.”

Working and breeding in Indiana, Wente spent several years in the Hoosier State building up his program and his contacts. When the day-to-day operations began to stagnate, and with the allure of bigger prizes just over the state line, he decided it was time to make a change and shift the center of his operations south of the Mason-Dixon.

“It got to the point where I wasn't getting anywhere. I felt like I was in a rut,” said Wente. “So, I had a buddy of mine in Kentucky that had a farm, and I had a chance to move in on that deal. I just made the switch and came down. I have two partners now, they're sod famers — Calvin Crain and Shane Crain — So they do sod and I do horses.”

The trio now owns and operates St. Simon Place, a nearly 400-acre farm in Lexington, Ky. While the Crains focus on their sod business, the Kentucky Turf Company, Wente keeps his priority on the horses. In addition to breeding and foaling, the farm also offers yearling prep, lay-up, and boarding.

With the move to Kentucky came the opportunity for more frequent visits to the sales grounds and Wente wasted little time in buying. His strategy from the start was to suss out the diamonds in the rough: mares with minimal price tags that hold the prospect of future returns.

Hidden Connection wins the G3 Pocahontas Stakes at Churchill Downs.

“I bought a few mares and one of those that I bought was C J's Gal, who is the dam of Hidden Connection,” he said. “She was only about $9,500. Then the other mare we bought was Jazz Tune, she was $20,000. Actually, she just had a winner the other day by Connect, a maiden special weight winner.

“Our 2-year-old crop this year is unbelievable. I sold and Indiana-bred for $130,000 in October last year. Donato Lanni bought her for Quarter Pole, and she (Electric Ride) ended up getting a TDN Rising Star mention on his first time out. I also bought a mare out of a sale named Spanish Star for $1,500 and I bred her to Trappe Shot. After that baby was born, Sir Winston won the Belmont Stakes (G1) and he is Spanish Star's half-brother, so I ended up selling her for $150,000 privately. That baby, One Timer, is entered in the Speakeasy Stakes at Santa Anita.

“Then we have the 2-year-old out of Jazz Tune, Rattle N Roll, broke his maiden at Churchill and he's nominated for the Claiborne Breeders' Futurity (G1) at Keeneland. I don't know if it will work out, but it's just so exciting because that's a “Win and You're In” race for the Breeders' Cup. And of course, Hidden Connection looks like the real deal and we're all so excited to see what she does.

“I think I spent like $300,000 at Keeneland last year in November and I got a lot of babies out of those mares. All of those will go straight into the sale this November. I thought last year was a buyer's market so that's why I bought, and it really looks like it'll pay off because I got some fantastic foals.”

Today, Wente's broodmare band is comprised of close to 45 mares, several of which he owns with another partner, Scott Stevens. That being said, he does have plans to pare down in the coming months. Both C J's Gal and Why Oh You — the dam of Electric Ride — are entered in The November Sale, Fasig-Tipton's premier breeding stock sale, with the understanding that if their foals don't jump up to hit the board in their next races, they could remain with Wente on the farm.

“I'm getting to the point though where I don't want to get much bigger,” said Wente. “I'm working on trying to get some numbers down because I get more happiness out of buying cheap mares, watching them hit, and then reselling them for more money. I love that part of the game. We're getting hefty offers on C J's Gal, but I was informed to shut that down. If hers or one of the foals hit, then I'll probably sell. I know those mares are hard to find, but I can't always afford to keep them.”

While he now breeds largely in Kentucky, Wente continues to foal out a handful of mares in Indiana and shares part ownership of the stallion Speightsong, who stands at Swifty Farm in Seymore, Ind. Wente does race some of his stock with trainer Mark Casse, but his priorities lay heavily with breeding and selling. With so much upside in the pipeline — from Hidden Connection to Elective Ride, to One Timer, to Rattle N Roll — Wente finally feels that he, and his horses, have found their stride.

“We had an incredible yearling sale this year,” said Wente. “I think we sold eight horses for $756,000. None were spectacular but they were all good horses, and it was a great sale for everyone. I think I have a pretty good program going and I've gotten to work with some great people like Carrie and Craig Brogden of Machmer Hall, who consign my yearlings. I owe a lot to them, they steered me the right way. I also have friends I count on like Tim and Nancy Hamlin at Wynnstay. They've taught me a lot, too. I'm just blessed that I've met so many people who really help me.

“I'm not afraid to listen and learn things. I don't know it all, I just take it all in. With this game, the highs are the highs, and the lows are the lows. There is not in between. You will have more lows than highs, but you have to keep pushing through. It just seems like everything we did and the money we spent is coming full circle. I don't know the method to my madness, but it seems to work. I'm just very blessed.”

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Breeders’ Cup Presents Connections: Against The Odds And Despite Her Doubters, Chichakly Is On Her Way

It's not an easy time to be a trainer of racehorses right now, let alone a new trainer. Amira Chichakly knows that as well as anybody, but she made the leap all the same, in the middle of a global pandemic and mass economic uncertainty.

Chichakly spent several years as an assistant to Gary Contessa, a longtime fixture on the New York circuit. When Contessa announced his retirement from public training in March 2020, he made it clear his departure was not the result of disillusion with the horses, but the headaches of running the business. Recent investigations by the U.S. Department of Labor have put a number of high-profile New York trainers in the crosshairs, adding time-keeping and record-keeping practices on top of the mountain of paperwork it takes to navigate a constricting federal visa program and recruiting skilled help.

“When I had 100 horses, I could absorb this, but when I have 40 horses and 20 of them are so-so, it's not enough to overcome what the Department of Labor is expecting of us,” Contessa said at the time. “There was a time when I was a 'super trainer' and I did very well. When you had the occasional owner who defaulted on you, you had the horses you got stuck with, you had Department of Labor audits, winning would overcome all of that stuff. But when you have a smaller stable — unless you do everything yourself — I don't see how you can do this.”

Into these woes walked Chichakly, who had long pondered putting out her own shingle.

“I pretty much got the choice of, I could take Gary's offer to take things on or be jobless,” she said. “Nobody was hiring anybody at the time. I don't like sitting idle, so I decided I was going full steam into this.”

When Chichakly got the call from Contessa, she had just learned she was pregnant with her daughter, though she wasn't yet sharing that publicly. The timing probably could not have been more challenging, but it also wasn't a good time to suddenly become unemployed. She had decided some time before that she needed at least eight horses to make a profit, and with Contessa's offer to transition previous owners over to her, she had 11.

In her time working for Contessa and Wayne Catalano, she had seen the glories of being a trainer but also the headaches. It seemed there were an awful lot of headaches, but like many people in this business, the lure of the horse made it seem worth it.

“Looking at it I thought, it's not so glorious to be a trainer,” she said. “But I do love figuring out horses, putting the pieces together and figuring out what works for them. I like to be able to find the best parts of the horse and making sure they're happy, too.”

Chichakly multi-tasks in the barn aisle

Chichakly has galloped for many years and still gets on her own string as often as she can, having discovered she can often feel little changes she doesn't always see from the ground. Her dressage training enables her to not only pick up on weaknesses and asymmetry, but also to work in stretching and bending to help correct those issues before they turn into big problems.

In addition to the usual woes of struggling to hire reliable help and get each the day's work done, Chichakly also believes there's a sense of jealousy toward new trainers on the backstretch.

“I think that's true for any young trainer starting out,” she said. “There's always doubters, people who are waiting for someone to fail. I don't think that's specific to me, I see it with other people too. Being a female trainer, too. There are people out there that say we can't do it. Number one word out there is 'crazy.' People love saying that word … I know another female trainer right now who's going through that. She feels like people are actively rooting against her and I don't think she's wrong, because I hear people talking about her or other young trainers. 'Oh they'll never make it,' 'Oh they don't know what they're doing,' or 'They won't last that long.' And it's sad, because we need small trainers for racing to survive. They don't understand their competition is not the person who's got five horses, it's the person who has 500 horses.

“If someone's passionate enough to be here every day, you should be rooting for them. Because there aren't that many left.”

A year and a half later though, things are coming together. Chichakly has saddled 11 winners and is already graded stakes-placed, thanks to Limonite, who picked up third in the Grade 3 Excelsior and second in the Stymie earlier this year. Now, her hopes are high for 2-year-old Our Tiny Dancer, who broke her maiden at Delaware Park Sept. 9 and is entered in the Joseph A. Gimma Stakes at Belmont on Sept. 24. The New York-bred filly was the first winner for sire Union Jackson.

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“Because of COVID-19 and being pregnant, then a new mother and a new business owner with little help, I really couldn't get to the sales early on,” Chichakly recalled. “Something I had been so excited for as a trainer, I had to miss. This year, I was getting really frustrated missing OBS and not having 2-year-olds and I knew I had to go to Maryland myself. I'm sure everyone was laughing at the dog and baby in tow but I brought them both to all the under tack shows.

“Right away the Union Jacksons stood out to me, despite not knowing him as a racehorse.”

Chichakly had her eye on several, but found herself either priced out or outbid. Contessa was also at the sale and tipped her off to the chestnut filly, ultimately acting as agent for the purchase as Chichakly signed her first sales ticket. Owned by a partnership including John Moirano, Pines Stables, John Irwin and Sallie P Thoroughbred Racing, Chichakly took a few starts to figure out exactly what the filly needed – soft turf wasn't her thing, and she missed her break in her first dirt start. She took a small string to Delaware Park for a week – with no staff – expecting there would be a place for the filly that would be a little friendlier.

“She delivered above and beyond my hopes for that start,” said Chichakly. “She's not magically a Breeders' Cup-type horse, but she packs quite a punch and should be quite capable in New York fields moving forward.”

One of Chichakly's watercolors

Never one to sit idly, Chichakly still does much of the hot walking, stall cleaning, and grooming herself in addition to the usual training responsibilities of setting schedules, reading condition books, dealing with the books. When she isn't doing the job of several people, she also dabbles in the visual arts. She sometimes helps photograph major race days for the New York Racing Association if she's not running horses, and paints watercolors – all while juggling care of her young daughter. On Whitney Day, she was marching up and down the track with a 9-month-old baby in a pack on her back.

“Someone got a picture I think, I had her on my back and one camera on one shoulder and the other camera on the other shoulder,” Chichakly said. “I think when you're a horseman you're a multitasker anyway. When I was assistant trainer for Gary, he'd leave me sometimes with 60 horses at Belmont when they were in Saratoga, and I was on the pony too and sometimes riding. To be able to watch everything and get through the day, to have people not show up you get really used to having one thought here and one thought there, and working it as you're moving. You don't think about how much you actually did until you sit down at the end of the day and realize how tired you are.”

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Breeders’ Cup Presents Connections: Improving Miss Marissa Could Bring Ryerson To Del Mar

It may have been more than a decade since Jim Ryerson has had a graded stakes winner in his barn, but he certainly hasn't forgotten what to do with one. The 4-year-old filly Miss Marissa proved that fact decisively with her victory in the Grade 2 Delaware Handicap on July 10.

“You have to train the horses that you have and you try to do the best you can for the owners that you have,” Ryerson said of the in-between years. “Then at times a nice one comes along, I think we have an idea of what to do with them when we get them. But if you should ever think that it's a given to always have nice horses in the barn, you're in the wrong business!”

With the filly now pointing to the Grade 1 Personal Ensign near the end of the Saratoga meet, 68-year-old Ryerson is remembering to savor the experience along the way.

The trainer had to take his time developing Miss Marissa for owner Alfonso Cammarota, to whom Ryerson was recommended by Frank and Patricia Generazio three years ago. A New York-bred daughter of He's Had Enough, Miss Marissa needed four starts to break her maiden as a 2-year-old, then the pandemic last year caused major interruptions in the first half of her 3-year-old season.

Miss Marissa really started to put it all together last July, winning an allowance race at Ryerson's old stomping grounds of Monmouth Park to kick off a three-race win streak that culminated in the G2 Black-Eyed Susan at Pimlico in October.

“That all followed stretching her out to two turns, which really helped her,” Ryerson explained. “She then ran a pretty good second in the Ladies (Handicap) in January, got beat by a filly of Todd (Pletcher's), and I didn't think the track was to her liking at all that day. We had made up our minds to give her a break after that, and she's come back very well.”

After a five-month layoff, Miss Marissa ran second to Dream Marie in the listed Obeah Stakes at Delaware on June 9, then stepped up to capture the G2 Delaware 'Cap a month later by 1 ¼ lengths.

“You like to see a filly progress from three to four – she's gonna have to run faster and all – and I think you can see signs that she's doing that,” said Ryerson. “You have Letruska, Swiss Skydiver, some other fillies that ran a good bit faster than her last year, but she's narrowed the gap. I think she has controlling speed, she's not one-dimensional where she has to have the lead, but she can carry her speed and there aren't a lot out there that have done that.”

Miss Marissa wins the Grade 2 Delaware Handicap at Delaware Park.

He acknowledges that the Personal Ensign will be a big step up in class, but Ryerson thinks Miss Marissa is capable of continuing to progress in what will be her third start off the layoff.

“We're stabled here (at Saratoga) and she won here last year, so that goes into it,” the trainer explained. “I think her effort in the Delaware Handicap puts us there. It's a pretty big jump but I think it's time to try and make it, and we've got about six weeks to get ready for that.”

The Personal Ensign is a “Win and You're In” race which offers the winner an expenses-paid berth to the Breeders' Cup Distaff this fall at Del Mar.

Should Miss Marissa earn a trip to the West Coast, it won't be Ryerson's first experience at the Breeders' Cup. He saddled the winner of the Breeders' Cup Juvenile in 1995: Unbridled's Song.

Later a champion sire, Unbridled's Song also won the 1996 Florida Derby and Wood Memorial before a well-publicized foot issue leading up to the Kentucky Derby. The colt wound up finishing fifth in the Run for the Roses.

Ryerson also had multiple graded stakes-winning millionaire Park Avenue Ball run in his hometown's Breeders' Cup World Championships at Monmouth Park. in 2007.

“I haven't had too many opportunities in the Breeders' Cup, but this filly, looking at her going into this year, I think if she can win a couple this year, she can get herself in that discussion,” Ryerson said of Miss Marissa.

No matter how this season pans out, Ryerson has come a long way from the 15-year-old kid who walked onto the Monmouth backstretch looking for a summer job. He became a well-known figure on the New Jersey circuit for several decades, but made the decision to move his stable to New York full time about 10 years ago.

“I was looking for a place that I could continue doing what I love doing; because of the lost dates in New Jersey, there were a lot of opportunities lost in the state,” said Ryerson. “My wife and all my kids still live in Monmouth County, along with all our grandchildren, so it wasn't an easy decision to make.

“My wife understands, but she stays there while I work in New York because it keeps her happy, and I then try to be the grandfather I want to be. You try to make the time. It's not as much as I would like, of course, because it's hard sometimes, but it's doable.”

With 17 horses at Saratoga and another 13 at Belmont, Ryerson said he definitely still enjoys coming to work every morning.

“I know that I'm not getting any younger, but I love doing it and I think that I can offer clients a good option as a horse trainer. I'm probably as busy now, even though I don't have a huge outfit, compared to five years ago, 10 years ago, so I think it's been a good move (to New York).”

Besides, you just never know when the next good horse will walk into your barn.

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Breeders’ Cup Presents Connections: Burke Brings A Lifetime Of Experience To His Role With Godolphin

Veteran horseman Johnny Burke claims he's a “small cog” in the grand scheme of the Godolphin operation, but every good engineer knows that every cog in the machine, no matter how small, has to work together in perfect synchronicity to produce the desired outcome.

“I'm part of a big, global team, just trying to get the boss in the winner's circle,” Burke said. “It's me that's having the good fortune to work with these guys, the whole team. Any time we get to be associated with a horse that's winning, we enjoy knowing that we played a part in it.”

One of the top older horses in training to have come through the Godolphin rehab and pre-training barn Burke runs at Keeneland is Mystic Guide, a 4-year-old son of Ghostzapper being aimed at the Dubai World Cup. Mystic Guide won the G2 Jim Dandy Stakes and placed second in the G1 Jockey Club Gold Cup last year, and began his 2021 campaign with a striking win in the G3 Razorback Stakes at Oaklawn Park on Feb. 27.

If he can find success in the UAE, Mystic Guide will be just the second winner Godolphin has sent from North America to the $12 million race, following the success of Street Cry in 2002.

That isn't the only reason the colt's success will have extra meaning for Burke, however. The Irish-born trainer counts himself lucky to have had Mystic Guide's dam in his barn when he first started working for Godolphin, and it would be pretty special to watch her have similar success in the broodmare shed to what she was able to achieve on the racetrack.

“Music Note was one of the charter members here at the Rice Road barn,” said Burke. “She was among the first group of horses I was rehabbing, and she turned out to be one of the better horses in America by the time she retired.”

Music Note, a daughter of A.P. Indy, broke her maiden at Aqueduct in November of her 2-year-old year. She would go on to three Grade 1 races as a 3-year-old, and a further two Grade 1 stakes as a 4-year-old. Music Note also ran third in both the 2008 and 2009 editions of the Breeders' Cup Ladies Classic before retiring to Gainsborough Farm with earnings over $1.6 million.

“I'm so glad for her to show up with this caliber of horse,” Burke said. “We've kind of been waiting on her to produce this kind of horse, so it's great to see her do that. You always want them to take that same performance between the rails and bring it to the paddocks.”

Music Note had found mild success in the breeding shed with her second foal, Ventura Highway (Street Cry), a gelding with no black type but a solid record (12-17-12) over 66 starts to earn $217,925 on the track.

The rest of the millionaire mare's offspring had yet to show the same kind of potential she'd had on the track, but that trend changed when Mystic Guide walked into Burke's barn at Keeneland in 2019.

“Usually the 2-year-olds get dispersed out of Ocala to their assigned trainers after the (Kentucky) Derby,” Burke explained. “Instead, he came from Niall Brennan up to me for a little bit, because he wasn't quite as forward. He was a nice, big, good-looking horse, though, and we just worked him a couple of times over the summer but mostly gave him time to grow.”

Mystic Guide went to trainer Michael Stidham's barn at the Fair Grounds before his first start in February of 2020, and the colt's recent effort in the Razorback has shown once again that Burke still knows a good horse when he sees one.

“For him to run a 108 Beyer off the layoff, that kind of thing always makes you feel good,” Burke said. “We'll be cheering him home in Dubai, for sure.”

Ghostzapper colt Mystic Guide wins the Razorback Handicap by six lengths under Luis Saez

Burke knows good horses, thanks to a lifetime of experience from the ground up.

The son of a steeplechase trainer who served his apprenticeship with the legendary Vincent O'Brien during his pre-Ballydoyle days, Burke has wanted to work with horses for as long as he can remember.

His father insisted Burke finish school, and as soon as he hit graduation Burke began riding out in the mornings. Burke attended the Irish National Stud Course in 1979, and spent a couple years in Australia before traveling to Lexington.

He spent seven years galloping horses and traveling for future Hall of Fame trainer Carl Nafzger, and eventually took out his own trainer's license.

“I didn't have anything else I knew how to do,” Burke said, laughing. “I ended up with one horse (in the beginning), and said, 'I'll keep going as long as I can.' I made a living at it, galloping a lot of my own horses, and rented half a barn at Paris Pike for a while.

“It's a tough business but a satisfying business, running a public stable. I have no qualms about the fact that I tried it; I wasn't going out with sky high ambitions. You know, they gave me a lemon and I tried to make lemonade.”

He trained a couple maiden winners for Godolphin over the course of his career, and in 2006, Burke got a call from Jimmy Bell about the organization's desire to open a year-round operation in a barn on Rice Road at Keeneland.

“It was a great phone call to get,” Burke said. “My days of getting on horses galloping were about over, and I said to myself, 'I'll probably never get a call like this again.'

“I do think mid-range horses teach you more about training than the real good horses, which basically train themselves. Good horses don't grow on trees, though.”

Neither do good employees.

“This business, you gotta have a bit of luck, but you gotta put a bit into it, too,” Burke summarized. “Hard work and reputation will carry you a lot further than anything else in life.”

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