Horse trainer
Encyclopedia
In horse racing
, a trainer prepares a horse for races, with responsibility for exercising it, getting it race-ready and determining which races it should enter. Leading horse trainers can earn a great deal of money from a percentage of the winnings that they charge the owner for training the horse.
Outside horse racing, most trainers specialize in a certain equestrianism
discipline, such as show jumping
, reining
, rodeo
, sport horse
disciplines, training of a specific horse breed
, starting young horses, or working with problem horses. There are a wide variety of horse training
methods used to teach the horse to do the things humans want them to do. Some fields can be very lucrative, usually depending on the value of the horses once trained or prize money available in competition. However, as a rule, most horse trainers earn, at best, a modest income which often requires supplementation from a second job or additional horse-related business, such as horse boarding or riding lessons.
According to The American Racing Manual, the thoroughbred horse racing trainers who have led the annual money-earning list more than twice since 1908 are:
Horse racing
Horse racing is an equestrian sport that has a long history. Archaeological records indicate that horse racing occurred in ancient Babylon, Syria, and Egypt. Both chariot and mounted horse racing were events in the ancient Greek Olympics by 648 BC...
, a trainer prepares a horse for races, with responsibility for exercising it, getting it race-ready and determining which races it should enter. Leading horse trainers can earn a great deal of money from a percentage of the winnings that they charge the owner for training the horse.
Outside horse racing, most trainers specialize in a certain equestrianism
Equestrianism
Equestrianism more often known as riding, horseback riding or horse riding refers to the skill of riding, driving, or vaulting with horses...
discipline, such as show jumping
Show jumping
Show jumping, also known as "stadium jumping," "open jumping," or "jumpers," is a member of a family of English riding equestrian events that also includes dressage, eventing, hunters, and equitation. Jumping classes commonly are seen at horse shows throughout the world, including the Olympics...
, reining
Reining
Reining is a western riding competition for horses where the riders guide the horses through a precise pattern of circles, spins, and stops. All work is done at the lope and gallop; the fastest of the horse gaits...
, rodeo
Rodeo
Rodeo is a competitive sport which arose out of the working practices of cattle herding in Spain, Mexico, and later the United States, Canada, South America and Australia. It was based on the skills required of the working vaqueros and later, cowboys, in what today is the western United States,...
, sport horse
Sport horse
Sport horse, or Sporthorse, is a term used to describe a type of horse, rather than any particular breed. The term generally refers to horses bred for the traditional Olympic equestrian sporting events of dressage, eventing, show jumping, and combined driving. The precise definition varies...
disciplines, training of a specific horse breed
Horse breed
Horse breed is a broad term with no clear consensus as to definition, but most commonly refers to selectively bred populations of domesticated horses, often with pedigrees recorded in a breed registry. However, the term is sometimes used in a very broad sense to define landrace animals, or...
, starting young horses, or working with problem horses. There are a wide variety of horse training
Horse training
Horse training refers to a variety of practices that teach horses to perform certain behaviors when asked to do so by humans. Horses are trained to be manageable by humans for everyday care as well as for equestrian activities from horse racing to therapeutic horseback riding for people with...
methods used to teach the horse to do the things humans want them to do. Some fields can be very lucrative, usually depending on the value of the horses once trained or prize money available in competition. However, as a rule, most horse trainers earn, at best, a modest income which often requires supplementation from a second job or additional horse-related business, such as horse boarding or riding lessons.
United Kingdom & Ireland
- John GosdenJohn GosdenJohn Gosden is a racehorse trainer. Having trained over 2,000 winners since his return to England in 1989, including winners of the Breeders' Cup Classic, the Derby, the King George, the 1,000 Guineas and the St. Leger, he is generally considered one of the most successful racehorse trainers of...
- Michael StouteMichael StouteSir Michael Ronald Stoute is a Barbadian British thoroughbred horse trainer in flat racing. Stoute, whose father was the Chief of police for Barbados, left the island in 1964 at the age of 19 to become an assistant to trainer Pat Rohan and began training horses on his own in 1972...
- Henry CecilHenry CecilSir Henry Richard Amherst Cecil is a successful English horse racing trainer who has had many winners in the Epsom Derby, 1,000 Guineas and 2,000 Guineas, Epsom Oaks and the St. Leger Stakes....
- Mick ChannonMick ChannonMichael Roger "Mick" Channon is a sportsman who enjoyed a career as a striker with Southampton and England in the 1970s and later became a hugely successful racehorse trainer.-Southampton:...
- Luca CumaniLuca CumaniLuca M. Cumani is an Italian thoroughbred horse trainer. He has trained at Bedford House Stables in Newmarket, England since 1976...
- Aidan O'BrienAidan O'BrienAidan Patrick O'Brien is an Irish horse racing trainer. Since 1996, he has been the private trainer at Ballydoyle Stables near Cashel in County Tipperary for John Magnier and his Coolmore Stud associates....
- Dick HernDick HernWilliam Richard "Dick" Hern, CVO, was an English Thoroughbred racehorse trainer and winner of sixteen British Classic Races between 1962 and 1995, and was Champion Trainer on four occasions....
- Mark Johnston
- Henrietta Knight
- Paul NichollsPaul Nicholls (horse racing)Paul Nicholls is a British National Hunt horse trainer with stables at Ditcheat, Somerset. A relatively successful jump jockey, Nicholls has become the leading National Hunt trainer of his generation, finishing the 2007-2008 season with 155 winners and a record £4 million in prize money...
- Vincent O'BrienVincent O'BrienDr. Michael Vincent O'Brien was an Irish race horse trainer from Churchtown, County Cork, Ireland. In 2003 he was voted the greatest influence in horse racing history, according to a worldwide vote hosted by the Racing Post newspaper...
- Ted WalshTed WalshTed Walsh is an amateur jockey turned racehorse trainer, based in Kill, County Kildare, Ireland. He was born and raised in Co. Cork. As a rider, one of his most important wins was on Attitude Adjuster in the 1986 Cheltenham Festival Foxhunter Chase...
United States
- Steve AsmussenSteve AsmussenSteven Mark Asmussen is an American Thoroughbred racehorse trainer. Born into a horse racing family, his parents, Keith and Marilyn "Sis" Asmussen, are both trainers who operate El Primero Training Center off the Mines Road in Laredo, the seat of Webb County in south Texas...
- Bob BaffertBob BaffertRobert A. "Bob" Baffert is an American horse owner and trainer, whose horses have won three Kentucky Derbies, five Preakness Stakes, one Belmont Stakes and two Kentucky Oaks. He graduated from the University of Arizona's with a Bachelor of Science degree. -Early career:Bob Baffert began his...
- Patrick L. Biancone
- Christophe ClementChristophe ClementChristophe Clement is a Thoroughbred horse trainer in the United States.- Racing background :Christophe Clement initially acquired his training skills from father Miguel, a leading trainer in France, Christophe later worked for the prominent French racing family of trainer Alec Head...
- Michael Dickinson
- Robert J. Frankel
- H. Allen JerkensH. Allen JerkensHarry Allen Jerkens is an American Thoroughbred race horse Hall of Fame trainer.Jerkens' father owned a riding academy on Long Island that led to his interest in horse racing and in 1950 he trained his first winner. Sometimes called the "Giant Killer", he is best known for his upsets...
- D. Wayne LukasD. Wayne LukasDarrell Wayne Lukas is a former educator who became one of the most successful horse trainers in American Thoroughbred horse racing history and a U.S...
- Richard MandellaRichard MandellaRichard Eugene Mandella is a Thoroughbred horse trainer and a member of the U.S. Racing Hall of Fame....
- Michael R. Matz
- Ron McAnallyRon McAnallyRonald L. McAnally is an American Hall of Fame trainer in Thoroughbred horse racing. Called "one of the most honored and respected of North American trainers" by Thoroughbred Times Co., Inc, as a child, he and his four siblings were placed in an orphanage following the death of their mother...
- Shug McGaughey
- Kiaran McLaughlinKiaran McLaughlinKiaran P. McLaughlin is an American Thoroughbred racehorse trainer. He currently has a blog website, at http://kiaranmclaughlin.com where he updates what horses he has racing for that particular day...
- William I. Mott
- Todd PletcherTodd PletcherTodd Pletcher is a leading American thoroughbred horse trainer. He has won four consecutive Eclipse Awards as outstanding Trainer of the Year, while topping the leader board in purse earnings in 2004, 2005, and 2006. His horse Super Saver won the 2010 Kentucky Derby, the first of his 24 horses...
- Monty RobertsMonty RobertsMarvin Earl "Monty" Roberts is a horse trainer whose 1996-1997 autobiography, The Man Who Listens to Horses, became a best-seller...
- Barclay TaggBarclay TaggBarclay Tagg is an American thoroughbred horse trainer. A 1961 graduate of Pennsylvania State University with a degree in Animal Husbandry, he is best known for conditioning Kentucky Derby, Preakness, and Jockey Club Gold Cup winner Funny Cide. Horses in Tagg's stable have included Showing Up and...
- Stacy WestfallStacy WestfallStacy Westfall is a professional horse trainer who specializes in reining. She was the first woman to compete in, and to win the "Road to the Horse" competition. In 2006 she won the American Quarter Horse Congress Freestyle Reining competition on the black mare Whizards Baby Doll, riding both...
- Charlie WhittinghamCharlie WhittinghamCharles Edward Whittingham was an American thoroughbred race horse trainer who is one of the most acclaimed trainers in U.S. racing history....
According to The American Racing Manual, the thoroughbred horse racing trainers who have led the annual money-earning list more than twice since 1908 are:
- D. Wayne LukasD. Wayne LukasDarrell Wayne Lukas is a former educator who became one of the most successful horse trainers in American Thoroughbred horse racing history and a U.S...
(14) - Sam HildrethSam HildrethSamuel Clay Hildreth was an American Thoroughbred horse racing Hall of Fame trainer and owner.Born in Independence, Missouri, Sam Hildreth began his training career in 1887, competing at racetracks in the Midwestern United States with such horses as the good racemare Hurley Burley, the dam of...
(9) - Charlie WhittinghamCharlie WhittinghamCharles Edward Whittingham was an American thoroughbred race horse trainer who is one of the most acclaimed trainers in U.S. racing history....
(7) - Sunny Jim FitzsimmonsSunny Jim FitzsimmonsJames Edward Fitzsimmons was a thoroughbred racehorse trainer.Born in Sheepshead Bay in Brooklyn, New York, Fitzsimmons began his career in 1885 working at a racetrack as a stable boy. After nearly ten less-than-successful years as a thoroughbred jockey, he became too heavy for that job and took...
, Horace A. "Jimmy" Jones (5) - Bob BaffertBob BaffertRobert A. "Bob" Baffert is an American horse owner and trainer, whose horses have won three Kentucky Derbies, five Preakness Stakes, one Belmont Stakes and two Kentucky Oaks. He graduated from the University of Arizona's with a Bachelor of Science degree. -Early career:Bob Baffert began his...
, Laz BarreraLaz BarreraLazaro Sosa Barrera was a Cuban-born American Hall of Fame thoroughbred racehorse trainer.Born in Havana, "Laz" Barrera was one of nine brothers who went on to become involved in thoroughbred horse racing in the United States...
, Ben A. JonesBen A. JonesBenjamin Allyn Jones was a thoroughbred horse trainer.Born in Parnell, Missouri, Ben Jones went into the business of breeding and training of thoroughbreds during the first decade of the 20th century, racing his horses on small circuits in the American West and in Mexico...
, William MolterWilliam MolterWilliam "Willie" Molter was an American Hall of Fame horse trainer in the sport of Thoroughbred racing.A native of Fredericksburg, Texas, Willie Molter began his career in horse racing as a jockey at racetracks across the Texas border in Mexico...
(4) - Hirsch JacobsHirsch JacobsHirsch Jacobs was an American thoroughbred horse trainer and owner.Jacobs was the leading race-winning trainer in the United States 1933-39, 1941–44, the U.S. leading money-winning trainer, 1946, 1960, 1965, and the U.S. leading money-winning breeder, 1964-67...
, Edward A. NeloyEdward A. NeloyEdward Albert "Eddie" Neloy was an American Thoroughbred racehorse trainer. At age fourteen, he began working at a racetrack then joined the United States Army during World War II...
, James G. Rowe, Sr. (3)
Australia
- Bart CummingsBart CummingsJames Bartholomew 'Bart' Cummings, AM is one of the most successful Australian racehorse trainers. He is known as the Cups King, referring to the Melbourne Cup, as the he has won the 'race that stops a nation' a record 12 times....
- Tommy Smith
- Colin HayesColin HayesColin Sidney Hayes was a champion trainer of thoroughbred racehorses based in Adelaide, Australia.During his career he trained 5,333 winners including 524 individual Group or Listed winners. He won 28 Adelaide and 13 Melbourne Trainers' Premierships.-Early days:Colin was born in Semaphore, South...
- Gai WaterhouseGai WaterhouseGai Waterhouse is a Scottish-born, Australian resident horse trainer, businesswoman and a former actress-Career:...
- Lee FreedmanLee FreedmanDavid Lee Freedman is a prominent Australian racehorse trainer. In partnership with brothers Anthony, Michael, and Richard, he has been a prolific winner of Australia's major races in past 20 years, with four Golden Slippers, four Caulfield Cups, two Cox Plates, and five Melbourne Cups,...
- David A. Hayes