Trainers Baffert, Lukas share spotlight at Preakness
Lukas will try to spoil his bid with fifth-place Derby finisher Bravazo and long shot Sporting Chance.
The two used to be considered rivals. Today, they could take their stand-up comedy show on the road. Both have mellowed. They come from the same roots, racing quarterhorses. Their barns are adjacent to each other at Los Alamitos racetrack. And they are listed as co-trainers on an entry at Pimlico.
“We’re finally getting together on something,” Lukas told Baffert Wednesday.
Actually, they’ve been together for a while. Baffert sent a horse owned by his wife, Jill, to Lukas to train. Lukas won a race with him, and before he could even reach the winner’s circle for the picture, Baffert was calling his cellphone.
“I picked it up and Bob said, ‘Who would’ve thought 30 years ago — Trump would be president and Wayne Lukas would be my assistant!” Lukas said.
In the early days, it was the other way around. Lukas burst onto the thorough-bred-racing scene and changed the game. He flew horses coastto-coast for races. He turned a profession known for early mornings and leisurely pace into a bi-coastal, high-volume business. And business was good.
And business was very good.
“You walked back to his barn in those days and it was like Shangri La,” Baffert said. “It still is. People ask me where his barn is at Los Alamitos. You can’t miss it. White paint. Green grass. He just always did things in a distinctive and successful way.”
Baffert asked him for a job, back in his early years, but Lukas didn’t take him on. Maybe it was a blessing. While Lukas has turned out some of the sport’s best trainers, including Todd Pletcher, Baffert found his own way.
“I told him one day that it was a good thing he didn’t hire me,” Baffert said. “Or he’d be taking credit for all this.”
Lukas said the two never were heated rivals.
“What happened is media members and your colleagues tried to make us bigger rivals,” Lukas said. “So we went on and let the rivalry happen, and as soon as the sun set, we’d go to dinner. I will say, I don’t like him near as much now that he has all these winners.”
Lukas watches trainers and horses with as astute an eye as anyone in the business, as he travels from track to track. At Pimlico this week, he has been perched in a chair adjacent to a rear entrance to the stakes barn.
“Bob really is an excellent horseman,” Lukas said. “He gets great horses, but he does a great job with them.”
Baffert said he still sees Lukas as a bar to shoot for.
“He sets the bar so high. He’s up there. He’s always been my idol. He opened up the floodgates for the quarterhorse guys. He completely changed it. … When I was training quarterhorses I wanted to be like Wayne Lukas. When I was training thoroughbreds I wanted to be like him.
“When people said I was the next Wayne Lukas, I thought no way. He’s sent so many great trainers into the business, the University of Wayne Lukas. I tried to hire as many people as I could who worked for him.” As for this week . . . “I really like where we are with Bravazo and Sporting Chance,” Lukas said. “But, when Bob got here with Justify and they led him off the van, I was sitting down there in a chair in the barn, and reality hit really fast. He’s a really nice horse. I told Bob I’d trade him my two and some cash to boot. He didn’t want to do it.”
Said Baffert: “Are you trying to jinx me?”
Maybe so. There’s a plaque on Lukas’ barn at Churchill Downs, denoting Lukas’ “World Record” 14 Triple Crown race wins. Lukas said he instructed his team, “Guys let’s just take that world record off, because Bob is going to keep on going.’”
But Baffert knows, perhaps better than anyone, that Lukas has a knack for this race that no one else has mastered.
“What Wayne and I had was that quarterhorse background,” Baffert said. “We’d bring a horse in ready to race one day and then turn around in a day or two to race for the money.
“You had to learn something about really getting a horse fit.”
They learned plenty. And now with Baffert age 65 and Lukas 82, they cast long shadows and not from riding off into the sunset.