Path to Derby can be perilous
Trainer Sano and his horse Gunnevera bring compelling tales to Saturday’s race
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Trainer Antonio Sano never expected to be here, having escaped Venezuela after being kidnapped twice.
The same can be said about a strapping foal who became an orphan shortly after his birth when his mother dropped dead.
Yet here they are at the home of Saturday’s Kentucky Derby, looking to fulfill an impossible dream with improbable story lines.
Sano found the colt and bought Gunnevera for his clients for $16,000, mere pennies in the horse industry.
But this tale began years before that.
Sano had acquired quite a reputation as a trainer in Venezuela. He got his first horse in 1988, and by the time he left 11 years later he had won 3,338 races and remains the country’s all-time leading trainer.
But life on the backstretch is tough in Venezuela. A so-called “horse mafia” has been known to kidnap jockeys and in one case drug a beloved favorite to alter the outcome of a race.
Rio Negro, a heavy favorite in the Army Day Derby, was injected
with a near-fatal dose of cortisone to compromise the horse’s performance and allow those in the know to win more money on a shot that suddenly wasn’t as long.
The Venezuelan Observatory of Violence says there are more than 40 kidnapping gangs in the country, some of which work with police.
The first time Sano was kidnapped, it was a lowgrade “secuestrado expreso,” or “express kidnapping,” where the victim is driven around the city and asked to empty out their bank accounts at as many ATMs as they can. He was captive only a couple of hours.
But on July 23, 2009, seven armed men emerged from an SUV in front of his house at 5:30 a.m. They dragged him into the vehicle and sped away.
He was held for 36 days, most of them spent in a room with no window, no toilet and no running water. He was shackled to the wall.
Sano’s wife, Maria Christina, got as much money as she could, sold assets and called upon the kindness of relatives, horse owners, trainers, jockeys and even grooms.
He lost 40 pounds while in captivity and was hospitalized for 10 days upon his release.
Sano has never disclosed the ransom amount, but colleagues put it at 700,000 Bolivars, which is about $70,000.
Kidnapping “is very common,” Sano said in an interview conducted in Spanish. “But I don’t want to talk about it. For me, it’s a very difficult story.
“There are a lot of problems in Venezuela. It’s very dangerous right now. To see this happen to the country, it’s very sad for me. I’m not going to go back.”
Sano, now 54, never raced in Venezuela again. Maria Christina, an engineering professor, insisted it was time to move. They initially went to Italy, from which their families emigrated, but the horse racing industry there is in disarray.
Next stop was South Florida.
He saddled his first horse at Gulfstream on April 3, 2010. He had his first winner that same day.
His stable has grown to about 50 horses, one of them called Gunnevera, named by co-owner Jaime Diaz Mengotti after a small town in Spain.
Gunnevera ran his first race on June 10 at Gulfstream. He finished second. He broke his maiden in his third race about a month later.
He won his first stakes race, the Saratoga Special, in his next race after shipping to New York.
He finished fifth to Classic Empire the following race, the Breeders’ Futurity Stakes at Keeneland, a points-bearing Kentucky Derby prep.
He moved down to Gulfstream, where he finished second in the Holy Bull, won the Fountain of Youth, and then took a game third in the Florida Derby.
Sano will be nervously watching from the owner’s box on the front stretch at Churchill Downs.
“This is the first time in my life that I’ll have a horse in the Kentucky Derby,” Sano said. “It’s very emotional. It’s everyone’s goal. …
“This horse has a lot of heart.”
Just like his trainer.