This visionary trainer’s keen eye, unique approach led 2 horses to Kentucky Derby
Kenny McPeek has fine eyes and flawed ears.
He is proud of his ability to see the potential in an unproven horse and slightly chagrined that he doesn’t always retain what he hears.
“I can go to a horse sale, look at hundreds of horses, and come out of there and go ‘Oh, yeah, that horse up in Barn 32, Stall 7, that’s by Smart Strike, that was the horse,’ ” McPeek said. “But I couldn’t tell you anybody I met. I can’t remember names. You can tell me a story, a joke — a really great joke — and I couldn’t retell it. It’s weird.”
It is, perhaps, to be expected, for Kenny McPeek is a man with a lot on his mind. He is the only trainer with two of this year's top 10 Kentucky Derby qualifiers —Tiz the Bomb and Smile Happy — and the self-described "crazy brain" behind one of thoroughbred racing's most extensive and ambitious stables.
Unlike the vast majority of American trainers, McPeek runs a comprehensive breeding, development, racing and rehabilitation operation out of Lexington's Magdalena Farm. He manages roughly 175 horses, including mares, foals and racing stock, while overseeing tractor repairs, accounting concerns and the Horse Races Now! application he has developed.
"If somebody comes up to him for the first time and meets him, odds are he will not remember," said Mike Mackin, whose Lucky Seven stable owns Smile Happy. "I've learned over the years, when he's focused, you just stand back and let him stay focused."
Seated in his barn office at Churchill Downs — below a sign that reads “Never Ever Question This Man’s Judgement” — McPeek describes horses as a “living, breathing art.” Then, in an astronomical analogy, he calls them “three-dimensional constellations” whose angles must be aligned just so or it would be like moving a star from the Big Dipper.
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If it seems a bit weird, it clearly works. With more than $97 million in career earnings, the 59-year-old University of Kentucky graduate stands to become the 28th North American trainer to exceed the $100 million mark sometime this year. Though he has yet to win the Derby, McPeek’s Tejano Run ran second to Thunder Gulch in 1995 and he has since claimed the last two legs of the Triple Crown with Swiss Skydiver (2020 Preakness) and the 70-1 longshot Sarava (2002 Belmont Stakes).
He paid $35,000 for Swiss Skydiver as a yearling. The filly eventually sold for $4.7 million.
“I think finding a good horse is harder than training it,” McPeek said. “I don’t think training is rocket science. If you do a good job at the auction, that fuels everything else “
He wants to see symmetry in horses’ “points of reference,” — the length of the head and neck, the depth of the shoulder, the angle of the withers, etc. — or he’ll pass “until you see all the parts in the right places.” In breeding, he prefers to match like with like on the theory that you “wouldn’t breed a beer bottle to a wine glass.”
Emboldened by his success in buying and training thoroughbreds, McPeek bought an abandoned 115-acre farm in Lexington and created a comprehensive one-stop shop in an industry accustomed to fragmentation.
Vision aside, he is something of a visionary.
Even those American trainers who manage multiple strings in various states typically confine their operations to the racetrack, too busy to bother with breeding, breaking horses, etc. But McPeek was intrigued by the soup-to-nuts approach he observed top trainers employ during a 2006 trip to Australia and, flush with cash, decided to bring that blueprint to the Bluegrass.
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En route home from Sydney, he found eight Lexington farms worthy of consideration, did a load of laundry, and quickly set out to study the various sites. Within 48 hours, McPeek had signed a deal to purchase a property he renamed Magdalena Farm, a place where equine breeding dates (at least) to the early 1800s.
The front page of the Kentucky Gazette of March 13, 1810, carried an advertisement for a British stallion called Crawler, whose stud services were available on the grounds for $6, “payable in any kind of produce at the market price.”
Much later, Derby winners Venetian Way (1960) and Dust Commander (1970) were conceived on the grounds. Tomy Lee, the 1959 Derby winner, performed stud service there.
“Today, it’s the core of our operation...” McPeek said. “I was concerned having a piece of property like that was a lot of trouble. (But) It’s actually pretty easy. It’s basically a racing stable with a lot of grass to cut.
“I actually enjoy it a lot more."
For a time, McPeek stopped training horses to concentrate on bloodstock and to care for his mother, Ann, who was suffering from primary progressive multiple sclerosis. As her condition deteriorated, she lost the ability to speak.
“She was at a point where she could only communicate with one finger,” McPeek said. “She had a little typewriter. She could type out when she was hungry or had to go to the bathroom or whatever. I sat there with her and she typed out ‘Get back to work. I’m OK.’”
Ann McPeek died in 2008. Her son’s work has since expanded and, for the most part, has flourished. McPeek's stable generated a career-high $7 million in earnings last year, with victories in nine graded stakes.
"The only thing missing from his credentials is a Derby and t Breeders’ Cup," Mackin said. "I think that would be great if he could check the Derby off his list this year. I’d be happy if it was with Smile Happy, but I’d be very happy for Kenny if it was Tiz the Bomb."
Watching his two Derby hopefuls work this week, Kenny McPeek’s lone complaint was about the travails of teaching his six-year-old daughter, Annie, how to tie her shoes.
“I’d rather have root canal,” he said.
Tim Sullivan: 502-582-4650, tsullivan@courier-journal.com; Twitter: @TimSullivan714
This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Kenny McPeek has Tiz the Bomb and Smile Happy in 2022 Kentucky Derby
