By Emily Shields From working at the track out of high school to owning her own veterinary practice and breeding operation, Dr. Tori Polzin has built her own success from the ground up. She is quick to eschew any praise, however, and turns it back to her horses and the team of people who have helped her reached her goals. At first the allure of the Sport of Kings made Polzin want to be a racetrack veterinarian. In time, however, the California native became more interested in mares and foals. After graduating from veterinary school at the University of California, Davis, Polzin began her work as an equine-only practitioner. It was only natural that Polzin would begin breeding her own mares, which led to an even greater venue. “I decided to try the sales,” she said. “The very first one I tried was the CTBA select sale when it was at Del Mar.” Now Polzin is a regular at the sales, breeding horses out of her Stony Creek Farm in... ...

By Emily Shields, California Thoroughbred W hen Lloyd Mason was only 5 or 6, his mother would drive him to a nearby horse farm, hand him a sandwich, and watch him ride off into the Arizona prairie for the day. “All of us kids would go out and ride for hours,” Mason recalled. “I fell in love with horses that way.” Arizona Chrysler tycoon Bill Luke, who at one time had 70 racehorses to his name, owned the ranch where Mason learned to ride. “My dad was good friends with him,” Mason said. “Every other week or so we got to go, and I couldn’t wait. The horses were already saddled for us, and off we went into nothing but tumbleweeds.” Mason still remembers sitting in the backseat of his parents’ car when his produce-farmer father discovered that a wicked hailstorm had wiped out their entire crop. “He said to my mom, ‘We’re done.’ Next thing I knew, he moved us out to Walnut Creek, in Northern California.” Although he... ...

By Emily Shields On a weekday afternoon when they have a horse running, Daryle Ann Giardino’s shouts of encouragement can be heard across the mostly empty racetrack while her husband, Mark, looks on, bemused. The scene depicts two of the Giardinos’ great passions: a love of their horses and their voracious desire to fill the seats with racing fans.   “The horse racing industry was at one time on top of the world,” said Mark, “and it’s like they kicked the can down the steps from the ninth floor. Now racing is in the basement, and they don’t know how to get it back up to the ninth floor.”   The Giardinos know just how thrilling horse racing can be because their homebred filly Home Journey has earned $279,920 and recently won the $100,750 Las Cienegas Stakes (gr. IIIT). They want to share that joy with as many people as possible, a drive that resulted in the making of “Behind the Gate,” their award-winning horse racing documentary.   That Mark... ...

By Emily Shields, California Thoroughbred Shortly after Singletary crossed the wire first in the 2004 NetJets Breeders’ Cup Mile (gr. IT) at Lone Star Park, his cheering, chanting owners flooded the winner’s circle. Their $30,000 investment had just scored in a $1.5 million race, and their infectious enthusiasm was broadcast live on national television. The president of the Breeders’ Cup, D.G. Van Clief Jr., called it “the greatest single moment in Breeders’ Cup history.” For Billy Koch the win was nothing more than an exclamation point on what he already knew: Horse racing is supposed to be fun. “I feel that all of us lose perspective on how much fun we can have in our lives,” Koch said. “We’re allowed to have fun.” The search for fun is what led Koch, a self-professed “lifetime racetrack junkie and degenerate gambler,” to create his first partnership in 1991. The Versailles Racing Syndicate gave Koch a solid first experience in group ownership. “Over the next 10 years I just kept starting all these... ...

By Emily Shields When the late horse trainer John Roche asked Roy Guinnane to claim a horse with him, Guinnane felt in over his head. “I didn’t even know what claiming was,” Guinnane said. Not one to sit back and let an opportunity pass him by, Guinnane dove in and returned home with both a newly claimed Thoroughbred and a Quarter Horse. “Within three months I had 13 horses,” he said. “Then I was buying weanlings and yearlings, and traveling to Kentucky to get mares in foal.” Guinnane, a 59-year-old resident of San Francisco, went from a racing novice to a regular at the sales in just a short while. Now he is represented on the track by dual stakes winner Marino’s Wild Cat, maintains a string of 25 horses, and runs a construction company in Northern California. His GCCI Thoroughbreds stands for Guinnane Construction Company Inc., which is his livelihood outside the game. “I actually love working,”Guinnane said. “I’m not one of these people who sits behind a desk... ...

By Emily Shields New California Thoroughbred Breeders Association board member Gloria Haley truly believes that horse racing is a team sport, and not just within each barn. Haley would love to see the powers in racing, both in the state and the nation, band together to fix mounting problems, such as purse troubles and finding careers for retired racehorses.   “Sport is important to me, and I love that that’s exactly what our game is: sport,” Haley said. As owners, trainers and racetracks, we all have to be unified in our effort to make racing succeed. We are like a clock, and we need to all turn as gears to make it work.”   Sports philosophy runs in Haley’s background, as the 63-year-old grew up officiating softball and volleyball games.   At Sonoma State University she studied physical education and physiology and eventually realized how much of what she was learning applied to horse racing.   “I was coaching at Santa Rosa High at the time,” she said, “when I... ...

By Emily Shields Nancy Probert has been a member of the California Thoroughbred Breeders Association for so long that it’s almost part of her identity. Although her parents had nothing to do with horses, an Irish grandmother is responsible for introducing Probert to the game. “She couldn’t drive, but she liked to bet on horses,” Probert recalled. “I started liking the sport and became a CTBA member in 1963.” Nancy also connected to horses via her mother, Dorothy Kitchen, a movie star who was in numerous 1920s westerns. Nancy’s Hollywood roots included her grandfather, Thomas H. Ince, a film industry leader who made more than 600 films. But Nancy’s passion for horses didn’t really take flight until she met her late husband. Nancy caught a ride to Catalina Island on the seaplane of Dick Probert, a well-known pilot. Later Dick required a stewardess for his plane, “Mother Goose.” He hired Nancy first, then married her. They were living in Long Beach when Dick decided he needed room for his planes;... ...

By Emily Shields “I had a fantasy my entire life of one day being a sports franchise owner,” said Scott Gross. “But you have to be a billionaire to do that. Owning racehorses is just like being a franchise owner, except it’s affordable.” Gross is 22 years into a journey that has seen him rise from state-bred maiden races to the Breeders’ Cup. Along the way he has been involved in various partnerships with close friends John Harris and Mark Devereaux. The latter is Gross’ partner on the grade II-winning California-bred Big Bane Theory. Although retired now, Gross was once a health care entrepreneur, working in hospital and outpatient services management. Before that, he went to Vietnam fresh out of high school, serving as a ranger medic. “I had to be careful that when I retired, I wasn’t just sitting around betting all the time,” Gross said. An avid horseplayer, Gross has “hit a couple of huge Pick 6 tickets,” and he admits that he loves all sorts of exotic... ...

By Emily Shields ARCADIA, Calif. (Dec. 9, 2014) — As a young man, D. Chadwick Calvert was taught in church to remember the initials CTR for “choose the right.” They meant the right path, but Calvert has since converted the CTR initials to mean Calvert Thoroughbred Racing. “Plus, I’m always trying to choose the right. . .horse,” he said The past few years have seen Calvert do an excellent job of choosing profitable young horses, but he has decades of experience to pull from. With his own expertise and the help of a longtime friend, the Colorado-based attorney is building a stealthily good racing string. Born and raised in Denver, Calvert was first introduced to the game by his lawyer father, David. “Around 1968 a client approached him and asked if he wanted to buy a couple of racehorses,” Calvert recalled. “He didn’t know anything about them, but the first horse was named Flying Morman, and my dad was Mormon.” That seemed a sound enough reason to buy in. Calvert... ...

At 82 years old, Clifford DeLima vowed to cut back on the number of horses in his care. The trainer has been busy with racehorses at the track, horses on his ranch in Livermore, and eight great-grandchildren to spoil. “I said I was going to cut down,” DeLima affirmed again, “but then Roy Guinnane and I went to a sale and came home with eight horses. We can’t go to sales anymore.” If DeLima and Guinnane are a little eager at the moment, no one can blame them. Their 5-year-old gelding Marino’s Wild Cat is now 5-for-9 lifetime after winning the $100,250 Harris Farms Stakes Oct. 5. The 5 3⁄4-length victory was so impressive that it has DeLima and Guinnane dreaming of future stakes success, maybe even in Southern California. DeLima has trained some classy horses before, but his is far from a household name. He was born and raised in Hawaii, and when he turned 15, a visiting colonel from the United States Army befriended DeLima’s father. When it... ...

By Emily Shields It is rare that someone in the racing industry is “just” an owner or “just”  a breeder. There is a constant juggling of hats that comes with the game: Exercise riders become the gate crew, farriers become bloodstock agents, and handicappers may find themselves buying into syndicates. Although Marsha Naify’s father, Marshall, was an iconic force in the sport, having campaigned the likes of Bertrando, Manistique, and Swept Overboard, Naify herself didn’t figure to become entrenched in it. She was working for the family business, United Artists Theater Circuit, while juggling real estate, aware of the racetrack and interested in her father’s exploits, but not overly enamored with it. When Marshall died at age80 in 2000, Naify found herself dealing with the dispersal of his equines, and despite herself, she purchased a few of them. Less than 15 years later she is one of those multifaceted industry gurus, not only breeding and racing her own horses but also sitting on the board of directors at the California Retirement... ...

By Emily Shields ELK GROVE, Calif. — Even as a young man in Germany, Joe Daehling “always liked horses,” but he couldn’t imagine where his passion would eventually take him. He tilled the fields of his native country behind powerful workhorses, admiring them and learning the skill of farming. “There were tractors in those days, but about half the work was still done with horses,” he explained. Daehling then immigrated to the United States in 1960, and after brief y pursuing life as an auto mechanic, he returned to agriculture. “I wanted to eventually fulfill my dream of raising horses,” Daehling said. “In 1973 my wife, June, and I bought a 400-acre ranch.” That property became Daehling Ranch in Elk Grove, Calif. While Daehling enjoyed making a business out of accepting boarders, he had yet to get his foot in the door of the racing industry. “I answered an ad for somebody who wanted to board a string of Thoroughbreds,” he said. “They brought out a whole bunch to live... ...

Back in the 1970s and ’80s, trainer Hector Palma was a force to be reckoned with. He won training titles and multiple grade I stakes races, and conditioned the likes of Irish O’Brien and Pen Bal Lady. After a lengthy quiet period Palma’s stable is returning to the spotlight, thanks to a new farm, the successful stallion Affirmative, and a classy filly named Magic Spot. Palma, 77, has been around a long time, but he still remembers his roots. The native of Mexico came up in racing in Tijuana before moving to the United States. “I worked for Michael Millerick,” Palma recalled. “Buster” Millerick, a member of racing’s Hall of Fame, is best known as the trainer of California-bred Native Diver, who won three straight Hollywood Gold Cups from 1965 to 1967. “I started training on my own on June 1, 1971,” Palma said. “I won my first race, and seven days later I ran my second horse and won that, too.” In 1976 Palma won his first graded stakes... ...

Richard Kritzski (R) accepts congratulations from Mel Stute and Joe Talamo after win by Awesome Return.   Three days after Awesome Broad dropped a bay son of Decarchy at Magali Farms, farm manager Tom Hudson turned to breeder Richard Kritzski and proclaimed, “We’ve got a stakes winner here.” Hudson’s declaration has already come true, as Kritzski’s Awesome Return is now a dual stakes winner. He is also another page in the story of Kritzski’s rise through Thoroughbred ownership, which started as recently as 1999 and has since been a bit of a whirlwind. Kritzski’s close friend Gary Brown can take the majority of the credit for getting Kritzski involved in the sport. In 1998 Brown was campaigning a handsome 2-year-old son of Broad Brush, Mr. Broad Blade, who broke his maiden stylishly by three lengths at Hollywood Park Nov. 29. As happens with most flashy juveniles winning over a route of ground, the victory thrust Mr. Broad Blade onto the Triple Crown trail. Kritzski joined Brown for that ride and... ...

When retired school teacher Alex Paszkeicz made the improbable jump to being an owner, breeder, and trainer, no one could have guessed the move would result in multiple stakes horses and more than $3.5 million in earnings. http://issuu.com/californiathoroughbred/docs/califthor-2014-6?e=1664187/8101693 ...

Ed Delaney is breeder of California Cup Oaks winner Susans Express. Q: When and how did you first get involved in the Thoroughbred breeding industry? How does your professional background influence your Thoroughbred breeding plan? A: I got hooked on race horses when I was an 8-year old kid. Every August my mother and I would board a bus and take the two-hour trip to Saratoga Race Track.  For me it was love at first sight—an experience I will never forget. Then in my mid-twenties I started buying some harness horses.   I didn’t get involved with thoroughbred breeding until nine or 10 years ago. A friend of mine who had already been breeding for a few  years kept urging me to get aboard. I finally jumped in, bought some broodmares, some breeding books, started reading the industry magazines a little closer, talked to as many people in the industry as I could and started the never-ending road of experimenting.   I’ve always been in business for myself so at first breeding... ...

Dr. William Gray and Jill Gray are longtime members of the California Thoroughbred Breeders Association. Q: When and how did you first get involved in the Thoroughbred breeding industry? How does your professional background influence your Thoroughbred breeding plan?   A: My first experience with breeding began in 1969 with my father, Wesley Gray in New Mexico.  We hauled an old mare in a one-horse trailer pulled behind our car to a small farm south of Albuquerque.  We unloaded the mare, she was in heat (apparently), bred the mare, paid the $100 stud fee, loaded her back up and took her back to the pasture.  She had a colt 11 months later.  It was easy money!   Now, 45 years later, I am a practicing veterinarian, running a multi-doctor practice and a small breeding/racing operation.  Now I have to deal with problem mares, sick foals, lame and colicky horses.  Many days I wish I could go back to that one-horse trailer, $100 dollar stud fees, and my dad paying for the... ...

Q: When and how did you first get involved in the Thoroughbred breeding industry? How does your professional background influence your Thoroughbred breeding plan? A: We first bred our first Thoroughbred race horse in 1994.  Prior to that, we had owned horses but never bred them.  We got into breeding because we had purchased a two year old in a sale that we thought had some talent.  Unfortunately, she was injured in her second race.  After much thought, we decided we would try our hand at breeding.   Becoming Thoroughbred breeders only enhanced our love of the sport.  We have continued to breed horses throughout the years and currently have three broodmares in foal. Although we still purchase yearlings and two year olds at sales, we are thrilled to raise and race home breds. It has added an additional thrilling phase to our experience as Thoroughbred owners. Being a general contractor and developer, I analyze property and visualize its potential.  Thoroughbred breeding is also trying to find the right combination to... ...

Occupation: Retired oncologist. Education: UCLA, University of Louisville, UCSF. Bred: Stakes winner Qiaona, stakes-placed Gangnam Guy. Owns: Stallion Roi Charmant, four mares. Member of CTBA since 1995. Stable name: B&B Zietz Stables, with wife Bev. Advice: “I think the best way to get into racing is by breeding. In my own way, I’ve been right but under the radar.” – Dr. Bruce Zietz. ...