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‘Starting To Get The Hang Of It Now’: Reeve McGaughey Saddles Second Winner At Ellis Park

Reeve McGaughey earned his first training victory in his home state Saturday as 12-1 shot Nathan Detroit won his debut in the sixth race for 2-year-olds at the RUNHAPPY Summer Meet at Ellis Park. But the 31-year-old horseman certainly is no stranger to the winner's circle in Kentucky and elsewhere.

McGaughey is the son of New York-based Hall of Fame trainer Shug McGaughey and veteran Kentucky horsewoman Mary Jane Featherston McGaughey. His uncle is Charlie LoPresti, for whom Reeve McGaughey was an assistant for five years during which time the stable had two-time Horse of the Year and three-time turf champion Wise Dan.

Before going out on his own, Reeve served for several years as an assistant to his dad, which made it easier for the elder McGaughey to run more horses in Kentucky.

“I've grown up around it between my uncle, my dad, my mom, my step dad (Brent Smith),” Reeve McGaughey said. “I don't think you're ever completely prepared for when it's your name in the program versus somebody else's, just the responsibility of it. But I think we're starting to get the hang of it now, hopefully.”

Reeve McGaughey sent out his first runner as a trainer on Feb. 2 at Arkansas' Oaklawn Park and earned his first victory in his eighth start. Nathan Detroit was his 20th starter for his Lexington-based stable that now totals 12 horses.

“He's been patient by doing it so he didn't get overrun with maybe not enough help and too many horses to deal with right off the bat,” Shug McGaughey, speaking from New York, said of Reeve building a stable. “I think he's done a very good job of that.”

Nathan Detroit is owned by Joe Allen, one of his dad's clients. Reeve also ran a horse Saturday at Ellis for the Phipps Stable, the powerful outfit that brought the elder McGaughey to New York from Kentucky 35 years ago.

“They'd all been around him,” Shug said of his owners and his son. “They all like and admired Reeve. If the horse wasn't going to do in New York, they wanted to have it with him down there. That's worked out well. It's not me pushing the horses there. We talk every day, because I'm interested in what he's doing. But I've also tried to stay away from it. I don't want to be influencing him one way or the other. If he had a question, I'd be glad to answer it.”

One big difference between being an assistant trainer and being a trainer?

“It's a whole lot easier to sign the back of a check than the front of a check,” Reeve McGaughey acknowledged. And winning? “It's almost more of a relief, to be honest,” he said with a laugh. “I think you stress out so much about every one.”

Each start with each horse means so much financially and otherwise to a small stable, perhaps even more when a trainer is trying to get established.

“You put a lot into each horse going into each race,” Reeve McGaughey said. “Maybe you stress a little more because you don't have three more to run the next day to make up for that one. So yeah, it feels good when they run well.”

Shug McGaughey, who won the 2013 Kentucky Derby with Orb, said he hopes his son learned from him. “But I think he's done a lot and put a lot into it himself to try to get this stuff figured out,” he said. “As he goes along, obviously he's going to figure more and more out.

“One of the good things about him is he's patient. He knows when to go and when to stop, and he's not afraid to do that. When I first started, I probably was a little hesitant on the stopping part of it. But he's not.”

The elder McGaughey said it was clear early on that Reeve would become a trainer.

“I talked to him about getting a job in the racing office, just to learn that part,” Shug said. “He said, 'No, I want to train horses.' It's been on his mind since he was a teenager. When he first started, I said, 'You know, you've got to learn from the bottom up.' And that's what he's done.

“He's put a lot, a lot of time into it. As a father, I wish he had more time to himself. But that's not the way this game is. He understands that. He enjoys being at the barn. That's what he likes to do, and he's not afraid to work. Hopefully it will start paying off for him.”

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Pastures of Point Lookout Honors Wyeth Memory

After spending many years helping to teach incarcerated inmates life skills and equine care, a lot of 10 retired Thoroughbreds boarded a van July 23 bound for Pasture of Point Lookout, a Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania-based sanctuary farm founded by world-renowned artist Jamie Wyeth in memory of his late wife Phyllis. On the anniversary of her passing Mr. Wyeth turned to longtime friends, Graham and Anita Motion of Herringswell Stables.

“To honor my late wife, Phyllis Mills Wyeth and her Belmont Stakes winner Union Rags, I am transforming our farm into a retirement sanctuary for racehorses,” Jamie Wyeth explained. “I view Pastures of Point Lookout as a lasting reminder of the contributions to the world of horse racing by Phyllis and her champion, Union Rags.”

Anita Motion will serve PPL as its executive director. The farm used by PPL has been modified to support the “pasture lifestyle” to which the TRF horses have become accustomed over their many years at the TRF Second Chances Program at Wallkill.

“It has been a remarkable experience to participate in the creation of Pastures of Point Lookout and to enable Mr. Wyeth to realize his dream for a legacy in his wife’s honor,” said Anita Motion. “Watching the horses step off the van on Tuesday and soak in the beauty of their new home was genuinely like experiencing a dream come true.”

The horses will live together, as they did for so many years at Wallkill, in a natural pasture setting. Run-in sheds will provide shelter from the sun and inclement weather, water is available from a nearby stream flowing through the farm, and the two full-time farm managers will manage their hay and grain, to supplement the abundant grass of their 20 acre pasture. All expenses for the operation of the farm along with the feed, farrier and veterinary care required by these horses will be covered by Pastures of Point Lookout according to the TRF’s Adoption Policies.

“When I first received Anita’s call to share this idea in late January of this year, I could scarcely believe what I was hearing. It simply seemed too good to be true,” said Kim Weir, Director of Major Gifts and Planned Giving at the TRF. “In less than six months, and despite all the challenges we have faced around the world in 2020 due to COVID-19, the dream has become a reality. With this bold and generous gesture, Mr. Wyeth has given ten horses the happiest possible final chapter of their lives while saving twenty total – the ten adopted by PPL, and the next ten retired racehorses that the TRF can accept into our herd to take their places over the months ahead.”

To learn more about adopting a horse from the TRF at https://www.trfinc.org/adoptretire/

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American Artist Jamie Wyeth Creates Thoroughbred Sanctuary In Honor Of Late Wife

On Tuesday, July 23, 2020, ten retired racehorses from the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation (TRF)'s Second Chances herd boarded a Brook Ledge van at the Wallkill Correctional Facility to begin a journey to their new home at Pastures of Point Lookout (PPL) in Chadds Ford, PA. Each horse has a unique story that led to his retirement with the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation, but they all shared a similar stroke of good fortune thanks to an extraordinary gesture of kindness, love and generosity. After decades spent teaching incarcerated inmates life skills and equine care, the ten horses have begun the final chapter of their long lives in a sanctuary farm created to honor the memory of a beloved wife, muse and horsewoman.

Pastures of Point Lookout (PPL), a 501c3 nonprofit organization founded in early 2020, was created to provide for the lifelong care of 10 horses from the TRF for the remainder of their days. PPL was created by the world-renowned American artist, Mr. Jamie Wyeth, in loving memory of his late wife, Phyllis Mills Wyeth (1940-2019). On the anniversary of her passing Mr. Wyeth turned to longtime friends, Graham and Anita Motion of Herringswell Stables, to help bring this legacy to life.

Anita Motion will serve as the Executive Director of Pastures of Point Lookout. She will implement the organization's guidelines and policies for equine care for the aging herd as well as providing oversight and hands-on management for the full-time farm staff who will care for the horses and maintain the 250-acre farm where they reside. Most recently the home of Belmont winning Union Rags (2012), the farm used by PPL has been modified to support the “pasture lifestyle” to which the TRF horses have become accustomed over their many years at the TRF Second Chances Program at Wallkill.

“It has been a remarkable experience to participate in the creation of Pastures of Point Lookout and to enable Mr. Wyeth to realize his dream for a legacy in his wife's honor,” shared Anita Motion. “Watching the horses step off the van on Tuesday and soak in the beauty of their new home was genuinely like experiencing a dream come true.”

Also, on hand to welcome the retirees were PPL board members Lisa Flagg and Katharine Maroney. On a very hot and humid afternoon, Lisa and Katharine were among several volunteers who helped unload and hose off the horses before hand-walking them down to their spacious new pasture.

“When I first received Anita's call to share this idea in late January of this year, I could scarcely believe what I was hearing. It simply seemed too good to be true,” said Kim Weir, Director of Major Gifts and Planned Giving at the TRF. “In less than six months, and despite all the challenges we have faced around the world in 2020 due to COVID-19, the dream has become a reality. With this bold and generous gesture, Mr. Wyeth has given ten horses the happiest possible final chapter of their lives while saving twenty total – the ten adopted by PPL, and the next ten retired racehorses that the TRF can accept into our herd to take their places over the months ahead.”

To learn more about adopting a horse from the TRF at https://www.trfinc.org/adoptretire/

The ten TRF adoptees have become the “inaugural herd” of Pastures of Point Lookout. Consistent with the TRF's intake policies, all of these horses are registered Thoroughbreds and all have raced at least once. Six of the horses retired to the TRF when they were no longer able to continue their racing career and were unable to pursue second athletic careers, and four of the horses spent a number of years in adoptive homes, returned to the TRF when they had aged out of their second careers.

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The Weekly Wrap: Ladies of a Certain Age

Let’s not forget, however great the lure of the sales ring or a wafting cheque book may be, thoroughbreds are bred to race. In the case of Prince Khalid Abdullah, Coolmore and Peter Brant, it could be said that we have three owner-breeders who are somewhat immune to commercially-based decisions when it comes to keeping a horse in training. Nevertheless, they are to be commended for racing on mares of the calibre of Enable (GB) (Nathaniel {Ire}), Magical (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) and Sistercharlie (Ire) (Myboycharlie {Ire}).

At ‘only’ five, Magical is the youngster of the trio. Even at six, the other two clearly still have many good years ahead of them at stud, granted a normal run. Their eventual offspring will likely race for their respective breeders, initially at least, so it’s not a case of missing out on sales of potentially lucrative yearlings, but remaining in training does present a degree of risk, however sound and talented the individual in question. It would have been all too easy to opt for the safe route and retire any of these horses after their 4-year-old seasons but, thankfully for the racing public, we are still able to enjoy their exploits on the track, putting them in an elite bracket of older racemares alongside the likes of Goldikova (Ire), Ouija Board (GB), Treve (Fr), Winx (Aus) and Black Caviar (Aus).

One vagary of this year’s disrupted and delayed season was that the G1 Tattersalls Gold Cup was run two months later than its usual late May slot and only a day after the G1 King George VI and Queen Elizabeth QIPCO S., thus giving Magical the option of staying at home rather than meeting Enable for a fourth time. Last year she was runner-up to the Juddmonte titan in both the G1 Coral-Eclipse and G1 Darley Yorkshire Oaks.

Plenty has been committed to print regarding the three-runner King George and, yes, it was unsatisfactory but, as already stated last week, far more unsatisfactory was the fact that the eight remaining runners at the five-day stage hailed from just two stables. Perhaps more concerning, in a week in which Investec dropped its Derby and Oaks sponsorship six years ahead of schedule, was to see the social media comment from Sheikh Fahad, who sponsors the King George with his brothers under their QIPCO banner, that it was “such a shame” to see the race attract only three runners after the scratching of Anthony Van Dyck (Ire).

Let’s hope that this is just a blip and that, in hopefully more regular seasons to come, the race holds its appeal for connections of the top 3-year-olds. It was a desperate shame not to see Love (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) take on Enable—perhaps we will at York. Now a record-breaking treble winner of the King George, Enable herself won it as a 3-year-old, as did her sire Nathaniel and grandsire Galileo.

Sistercharlie, representing one of France’s pre-eminent breeding operations, Ecurie des Monceaux, was perhaps a little ring-rusty in her delayed return in Saturday’s GII Ballston Spa S., in which she could manage only third. The winner, Canadian turf champion Starship Jubilee (Indy Wind) is another in the twilight years of a Flat career at the age of seven. That has clearly been no barrier to success in 2020, as this was her fourth consecutive victory of the year and she looks likely to be asked to defend her title in the GI EP Taylor S. The admirable mare has won 18 of her 36 starts and more than $1.6 million in prize-money. Not bad for a horse plucked from a Gulfstream Park claimer for $16,000 back in 2017.

Fine Season For Maglietta Fina
Enable remains the pin-up girl for her sire Nathaniel but he was also represented over the weekend by Lady Bowthorpe (GB), who recorded her first stakes success in the G3 Betfred Valiant Fillies’ S. at Ascot. In fact, all bar two of Nathaniel’s group winners are fillies, including his other two Group 1 winners Channel (Ire) and God Given (GB).

Lady Bowthorpe was contributing to a fine spell for her dam, Maglietta Fina (Ire) (Verglas {Ire}), a five-time winner over the minimum trip for her Rome-based owner-breeders Paolo and Emma Agostini of Scuderia Archi Romani. The Agostinis keep just two mares at Fittocks Stud and have had a long association with Luca and Sara Cumani, notably through their homebred G2 Challenge S. winner Le Vie Dei Colori (GB) (Efisio {GB}), who was trained by Luca.

For Maglietta Fina, Lady Bowthorpe was a second group winner of the season after her first foal Speak In Colours (GB) (Excelebration {Ire}) added the G2 Greenlands S. and G3 Ballycorus S. to his improving record. Some black type is also surely within reach of the mare’s 3-year-old Pretty In Grey (GB) (Brazen Beau {Aus}), who won her fourth consecutive race at Newmarket on Saturday off a mark of 86. The Italian connection continues as she is trained by Speak In Colours’s former trainer Marco Botti and still races in her breeders’ colours.

“The Agostinis are very small breeders but they have done very well over the years, particularly with fast horses,” said Sara Cumani. “What we have to decide now is whether Maglietta Fina’s Muhaarar (GB) colt goes to Book 1 or Book 2 of the October Sale.”

Maglietta Fina was herself a vendor buyback when offered at the SGA Select Yearling Sale in Milan in 2010, and both Speak In Colours and Pretty In Grey were retained at 25,000gns and 24,000gns when offered as foals. The William Jarvis-trained Lady Bowthorpe was bought by James Toller for her owner Emma Banks for 82,000gns, while last year’s Mayson (GB) yearling filly was the mare’s first six-figure sale when bought by John Foote for 100,000gns. Sadly, she has subsequently died while in quarantine in Australia.

Cumani added, “Lady Bowthorpe was a very good walker but she was the exception, and the reason Maglietta Fina’s progeny have not sold so well so far is that they are not terribly good walkers, but walking is not everything, as we know.”

Maglietta Fina has no foal this year but is now in foal to Holy Roman Emperor (Ire). She is a half-sister to the multiple group winner Tullius (GB), who won 11 of his 42 races and was a member of the second crop of Le Vie Dei Colori, who stood at Rathbarry Stud for three seasons until his premature death at the age of just eight.

Le Vie Dei Colori was not the only stallion bred by the Agostinis, who were also responsible for Italian group winner Per Incanto (Street Cry {Ire}), who stands at Little Avondale Stud and is currently fourth in the New Zealand sires’ table.

Meanwhile Lady Bowthorpe became the first group winner for Emma Banks, who also owns the useful Arigato (GB) (Poet’s Voice {GB}), who has two entries at Goodwood this week, and previously raced fellow Jarvis trainee and dual listed winner Mrs Gallagher (GB) (Oasis Dream {GB}).

Santosha Memorable For Many
The form of the G2 Duchess Of Cambridge S., won by Dandalla (Ire) (Dandy Man {Ire}), has been boosted twice in the last week. Firstly, runner-up Fev Rover (Ire) (Gutaifan {Ire}) won the listed Star S. over seven furlongs at Sandown and, on Sunday at Ascot, third-placed Santosha (Ire) reappeared to win the G3 Princess Margaret S. The filly became not just the first group winner for her trainer David Loughnane and young jockey Tom Greatrex, but also for her freshman sire Coulsty (Ire), who stands at Rathasker Stud.

Coulsty has had just nine runners so far, four of which are now winners, and he is one of four sons of Kodiac (GB) in the first-season sires’ list along with Prince Of Lir (Ire), Adaay (Ire) and Kodi Bear (Ire).

A daughter of Princess Zoffany (Ire), Santosha also became the first group winner as a broodmare sire for Zoffany (Ire) in the same week that Tiger Tanaka (Ire) (Clodovil {Ire}), who was third in the G2 Prix Robert Papin, provided his first black type in this regard. To date, there are just 20 horses of racing age out of Zoffany mares.

It was also a good week for Zoffany’s father Dansili (GB) in the broodmare sire division, where he was represented by G2 York S. winner Aspetar (GB) (Al Kazeem {GB}), and the listed winners Dark Vision (Ire) (Dream Ahead) and Valia (Fr) (Sea The Stars {Ire}).

Ladies First
Two breakthrough racing moments were provided in the last week by Claire Kubler and Hollie Doyle.

Kubler joined her husband Daniel as official co-trainer, the pair becoming the first husband-and-wife team in Britain to hold a training partnership. The BHA rule was changed in this regard in May to allow more than one name to appear on a training licence. To date, Paul Cole has been joined by his son Oliver, and Simon Crisford by his son Ed.

Doyle broke new ground by becoming the first female jockey in Britain to be retained officially by an owner, in this case Imad Al Sagar, who has previously raced Group 1 winners Authorized (Ire), Decorated Knight (GB) and Araafa (Ire).

Doyle has ridden 38 winners since the Flat jockeys’ championship started on June 1 and is currently lying in fifth place, ahead of former champions Jim Crowley, Ryan Moore and Silvestre de Sousa.

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