His work makes him a combination of coach and athletic director. But instead of alumni obsessed with winning one for the alma mater, he answers to owners whose checkbooks do the recruiting.
The upside is he knows where his athletes are every night.
The downside is he has to get up before the crack of dawn to hold his practices and his season can be unending.
Injuries are a constant, often coming at the most inopportune times.
Although his superstars never ask to renegotiate contracts, they generally retire after a couple of years.
It`s all part of the game, and the name of the game is training thoroughbred racehorses.
”It`s a game structured on a lot of lows and very few highs,” says Frank Brothers, whose 11-year career winning percentage is an amazing 25 percent.
This spring Brothers soared sky-high when he won two legs of the Triple Crown, the Preakness and Belmont, with Hansel.
Hansel and the others in Brothers` stable make Arlington International Racecourse their summer home.
Arlington is a racing melting pot. There are some trainers, such as Brothers, who spend the rest of the year racing elsewhere in the nation. Others stay on the Chicago circuit year-round, starting the season when Sportsman`s Park opens in mid-February and remaining until Hawthorne brings down the curtain Dec. 31.
Like Brothers, Carl Nafzger, Bud Delp and Noel Hickey excel at bringing out the best in the equine athletes whose dorms are on the Arlington backstretch.
The four horsemen`s stables are significantly different and their approaches are distinct, just as the basketball programs and coaching philosophies at Indiana, Duke, Nevada-Las Vegas and Princeton are dissimilar. Brothers, 44, is the private trainer for Joe Allbritton, a man of means whose estimated worth is $500 million.
Before accepting Allbritton`s offer late in 1988, Brothers had a public stable with many clients and horses that ran the gamut from claimers to stakes horses.
Then, he had 75 horses. Now, he has 25.
To help with the load, Brothers employs two assistants, eight grooms, five exercise riders, seven hot-walkers, a day watchman and a night watchman. ”I`m at the barn every morning at 5 o`clock and I usually stay till 11 o`clock, sometimes till noon,” said Brothers. ”I`m usually back at the barn in the afternoon-definitely if we run something. If not, I`ll usually stop by between 3 and 5 o`clock in the afternoon.”
Brothers` responsibilities with Allbritton also entail selecting yearlings at the major sales and working with the owner`s Virginia farm manager who handles the breeding end of the operation.
”I have input from the time the horses are born,” says Brothers. ”You live or die with what you pick. This year we won two of the three classics
(the Triple Crown races). That`s what we`re striving to do every year.”
Nafzger has similar objectives. Last year the 49-year-old horseman who once was a nationally ranked bullrider on the rodeo circuit sent out Unbridled to win America`s most famous race, the Kentucky Derby, and the world`s richest race, the $3 million Breeders` Cup Classic.
Nafzger has 45 horses in training and an average of eight or nine owners. ”My two major owners are the Frances Genter Stable (which bred and owns Unbridled) and Jim Tafel,” he explains. ”The others are investors who`ll send us a yearling or two a year.”
Like Brothers, Nafzger participates in the buying process, and his circuit is identical-from Arlington to the Kentucky tracks (Keeneland and Churchill Downs) in the fall and spring, then on to Florida`s Gulfstream Park in the winter.
”It`s exhilarating and wearying at the same time,” says Nafzger, whose wife, Wanda, works closely with him in running the stable.
Delp, meanwile, uses his son, Gerald, as his right-hand man. When the Arlington meeting ends they go back to their native Maryland to race at Laurel and Pimlico.
Last summer Delp became the ninth trainer in American racing history to win 3,000 races, but his biggest claim to fame is training one of the finest runners in modern times-Spectacular Bid.
Claiming horses was once considered Delp`s forte, but since Spectacular Bid raced into his life in the late 1970s he too has been concentrating on higher-class runners.
”I have 28 horses here,” says the 58-year-old trainer. ”Harry and Tom Meyerhoff (who owned Spectacular Bid) are my main owners. Another is Mrs. James Bayard, a member of the du Pont family who has had horses with me for 27 years. I have Teddy Bear Tears for Ed Fortino (Arlington`s director of facilities), and my wife, Regina, and I own the other four horses.
”Every summer and fall I go with and Tom to the yearling sales in Kentucky. Last year they bought 10-which is the most we ever bought-and they spent an average of about $40,000. They study the pedigrees, and I do the looking at the horses as athletes.
”They have fun and they don`t lose money.”
For Hickey, if either the owner or breeder of his horses winds up losing money it`s a financial crisis. Hickey is both owner and breeder of the 45 horses he has at Arlington.
A former 800-meter and 1,500-meter track standout in his native Ireland, he came to the U.S. via Canada where he prefaced his racing career by working in the investment business, specializing in mutuel funds.
”The brokerage business became a means to an end,” recalls Hickey, ”to become financially independent and get into horses full time.”
Independence came in 1971. Today he has five stallions and about 85 broodmares at his Irish Acres Farm in Florida.
Last summer Hickey had one of the most successful meetings in Arlington history. He had 49 winners in 189 starts, a winning percentage of 25.93. Dating back to the first Arlington meeting in 1927, never before had the champion trainer won the title with a cast made up exclusively of horses he bred and owned.
”I`m overly competitive, and it`s bad,” confesses Hickey, who spent the winter racing in northern California at Golden Gate Fields. ”I don`t take things philosophically enough.”
That`s probably an occupational quirk common to almost every man who makes living ”coaching.” Would Bobby Knight take things philosophically enough if excellence were translated as one Indiana victory every four games? THE FOUR HORSEMEN
Frank Brothers-Won the second and third jewels of the 1991 Triple Crown series, the Preakness and Belmont, with Hansel. . . Since 1980, has ranked among the top 20 trainers in North America in money earned on six occasions and races won seven times. . . Has won stakes with 95 horses and has a career winning mark of 25 percent. . . Captured the Midwest`s premier race for 2-year-olds, the Arlington-Washington Futurity, with Secret Hello in 1989 and Hansel last year.
Bud Delp-Trainer of Spectacular Bid, who had a career record of 26 triumphs, two places and one show in 30 starts, won the 1979 Kentucky Derby and Preakness and was Horse of the Year in 1980. . . Last summer at Arlington became the ninth trainer in history to win 3,000 races. . . Voted North America`s top trainer in 1980, and received Eclipse Award emblematic of the honor. . . Also has been leading trainer at Arlington, Pimlico, Laurel and Gulfstream Park.
Noel Hickey-Arlington`s defending trainer titlist with 49 winners in 189 starts. . . First time in track history that a trainer took the title with a stable made up exclusively of horses he bred and owned. . . In 85 grass races, was victorious 28 times for a 32 percent success ratio.
Carl Nafzger-Earned Eclipse Award in recognition of his selection as North America`s outstanding trainer in 1990. . . Last year`s major triumphs included the Florida Derby, Kentucky Derby and Breeders` Cup Classic with Unbridled, the Secretariat Stakes with Super Abound and the Super Derby with Home At Last. Won trainer title during Arlington`s 13-day International Festival of Racing in 1986.
