The Money Cide

by Robert J. Summers | Reprinted Courtesy of The Buffalo News

You say the saga of Funny Cide has inspired you and your friends to think about buying a thoroughbred racehorse? Well, there are plenty of people at the Fort Erie Race Track who can offer advice and encouragement.

The first piece of advice, of course, is don’t expect to get as lucky as Sackatoga Stable, the group of 10 friends who paid $75,000 for Funny Cide. It’s not often anybody finds a horse that goes on to earn almost $2 million while winning the Kentucky Derby and Preakness and finishing third in the Belmont Stakes.

But the Sackatoga group – which owned eight other horses in eight years before Funny Cide’s Triple Crown run – got started in much the same way as many other partnerships which run horses at Fort Erie and other tracks across North America. Six friends chipped in $5,000 each and bought a horse for $25,000.

That’s just about the amount of money that Tom Agosti, a North Tonawanda native who is the co-leading trainer at Fort Erie, recommends for starting a group that wants “to have some fun” at the races.

“Get about $25,000 in the pot,” Agosti said. “That will get you a couple horses and have money left over for expenses.”

“It used to be called the “Sport of Kings,’ but you don’t have to be rich now,” said Ralph Biamonte, a retired dentist turned horse trainer from Niagara Falls, Ont.

Of course, this should be “fun money.” Money you and your friends can afford to lose if your luck turns bad.

“Don’t use your mortgage money or your rent money or your car money,” said Scott Wagner, a Town of Tonawanda horse owner who started with $20,000 about eight years ago. “Get into it to enjoy yourself.”

“If you can afford it, every horseplayer should own a horse,” said Don Meyers, a one-horse owner from West Seneca. “You can’t explain the feeling you have when your horse wins a race.”

Meyers said he loves the competition and finds “you live vicariously through your horse.”

“I’m 67 and the night before a race, I’m as excited as I was when I played high school baseball,” he said. “No matter how cheap it is, every race is your Kentucky Derby.”

“Get rich first,” were the first words from Barclay Tagg, Funny Cide’s trainer, when asked at Belmont Park if he had advice for prospective owners.

Although Funny Cide’s owners – mostly small businessmen and professionals – are not as “rich” as many thoroughbred owners, “they are (rich) together. Ten successful businessmen are better than one,” Tagg said.

“You’ve got to have a lot of patience,” Tagg continued. “You have to be wealthy enough to afford it. . . . You’ve got to go into it as a hobby.”

“I’ve had plenty of people say that it will be a business for them and they can make money at it and all that kind of stuff. If you’re really, really wealthy and can buy the best horses that are bred and race them, your expenses are going to be so high that you probably won’t make money anyway.”

“Money obviously is a big factor in this game, but it’s not the only factor,” said Jack Knowlton, Sackatoga’s managing partner. “There’s some luck involved in it. And good training, good riding.”

The opening of the slot machine casino in 1999 has increased prize money at Fort Erie to a point where the chances of making a profit at horse ownership are a lot better than in pre-slot days. Ten percent of the profits from slots goes into the purses for races. On a recent Tuesday, for instance, a total of $202,600 (Canadian) was paid out to participants in the afternoon’s 10 races. That’s more than four times the average purse in pre-slot days.

“When I started (in 1995) I figured I had an 80 percent chance of losing money,” said Wagner, a certified public accountant. “Now you have a 30 percent chance of losing.”

“With these purses here, it’s almost hard not to break even,” Agosti said.

Wagner and Agosti advise new owners to get started with a “claiming” horse or two.

About 80 percent of the dashes at Fort Erie are “claiming races” in which any horse in the field may be purchased for a specified amount of money. On the recent Tuesday, for instance, horses in such events raced with price tags ranging from $5,000 to $25,000. Earlier this month, for example, in a race offering a total purse of $16,600, Agosti claimed the winner, a 4-year-old gelding named Rainbow Knight, for $7,500.

Under the rules of racing, the horse’s previous owner – a partnership called the “Six Brothers Stable” – kept the winner’s share ($9,960, or 60 percent of the total purse) plus the $7,500 that Agosti paid them for Rainbow Knight. If Rainbow Knight can win a race at the same level, the animal will have “paid for himself” in one start.

“There’s safety in claiming horses. They’ve already established their value,” Wagner said. “It’s a hobby, but it’s still a business. You’ve got to use sound business principles and procedures.”

“You’ve got to set a budget. You’ve got to have some type of business plan,” said Barry Hogan of Hamburg. Hogan, an Agosti client, owns Diamond Flight, a 4-year-old mare that once was owned by Sackatoga Stable. (“We bought it from the guy that claimed it from Barclay Tagg,” Hogan said.)

After deciding to get into the game, the most important decision a group of owners must make is picking a trainer, the person who manages the horse’s career.

“The biggest thing is knowing how to pick a trainer,” said Doug Gibbons, a former Fort Erie jockey and trainer who now works as assistant clerk of scales. “Pick a good trainer and let him do his job.”
“Don’t hire anybody you don’t think you can get along with or don’t like,” advised Tagg. “Hire somebody and let him do his work.”

“Make sure they communicate with honesty,” said Wagner, who said he interviewed 10 prospective trainers when he started.
Wagner and Agosti said they recommend that trainers and owners agree to the standard “day rate and 10 percent” agreement.

This calls for the owner to pay the trainer a set amount of about $40 to $50 a day for basic costs. In addition, the trainer gets to keep 10 percent of the purse money the horse earns when it finishes first, second or third.
“It’s going to cost a little over $2,000 a month to keep a horse,” Agosti said. “It sounds like a lot, but we’ve claimed horses for $5,000 that made $40,000 over the year.”

Of course, there are no guarantees.

“There are some fakes out there,” Biamonte warned. “A fake is somebody who tells you your horse is doing well when it’s not. . . . Somebody who always tells you everything is all right.”
Wagner recalled he claimed his first horse for $12,000 in 1995. In its first race for him, the horse suffered a career-ending foot injury.

“Looking back, that was the best thing that could have happened to me,” Wagner said. “It taught me how fragile the horses are and how tough this game is. I tasted the mat the first time out.”

Wagner, a lifelong racing fan, said he started thinking about ownership after attending a track-sponsored seminar for prospective owners. Herb McGirr Sr., Fort Erie’s director of racing, said the track plans to offer a seminar later this summer.

This entry was posted on Saturday, January 4th, 2003 at 5:12 pm and is filed under Featured Articles. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.