Vester R. Wright | |
---|---|
Occupation | Trainer |
Born | January 21, 1921 Gallatin, Tennessee |
Died | July 24, 1966 (aged 45) |
Career wins | 1872 |
Major racing wins | |
Florida Derby (1953) Louisiana Derby (1956) Churchill Downs Handicap (1958) Grassland Handicap (1958) Michigan Derby (1960) Breeders' Futurity (1961) Black Gold Stakes (1962) Forerunner Stakes (1962) Derby Trial Stakes (1962) | |
Racing awards | |
U.S. Champion Thoroughbred Trainer by wins (1956, 1957, 1959, 1961) | |
Honours | |
Fair Grounds Racing Hall of Fame (1991) | |
Significant horses | |
Roman Line |
Vester Richard "Tennessee" Wright (January 21, 1921 - July 24, 1966) was an American Champion Thoroughbred horse racing trainer who led all trainers in the United States in wins four times.
Born in Gallatin, Tennessee, he was widely known as "Tennessee Wright." His major race wins included the 1953 Florida Derby with Money Broker, the 1956 Louisiana Derby with Reaping Right. His best runner was probably Roman Line who won the 1961 Breeders' Futurity then in 1962 the Forerunner and Derby Trial Stakes before finishing second in the Kentucky Derby and third in the Preakness Stakes.
On July 24, 1966, Tennessee Wright's promising career was cut short when he suffered a heart attack and died at age forty-five. In 1991, he was inducted posthumously into the Fair Grounds Racing Hall of Fame.
James Edward "Sunny Jim" Fitzsimmons was a Thoroughbred racehorse trainer.
Whirlaway was a champion American Thoroughbred racehorse who is the fifth winner of the American Triple Crown. He also won the Travers Stakes after his Triple Crown sweep to become the first and only horse to win all four races.
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 in a worldwide poll hosted by the Racing Post. In earlier Racing Post polls he was voted the best ever trainer of national hunt and of flat racehorses. He trained six horses to win the Epsom Derby, won three Grand Nationals in succession and trained the only British Triple Crown winner, Nijinsky, since the Second World War. He was twice British champion trainer in flat racing and also twice in national hunt racing; the only trainer in history to have been champion under both rules. Aidan O'Brien took over the Ballydoyle stables after his retirement.
Samuel Clay Hildreth was an American Thoroughbred horse racing Hall of Fame trainer and owner.
Majestic Prince was a Thoroughbred racehorse. One of the leading North American horses of his generation, he won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes in 1969.
Steven Mark Asmussen is an American Thoroughbred racehorse trainer. The leading trainer in North America by wins, he is a two-time winner of the Eclipse Award for Outstanding Trainer and was inducted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in 2016. His horses have won the Breeders' Cup Classic, Preakness Stakes, Belmont Stakes, Travers Stakes, Breeders' Cup Distaff, Kentucky Oaks and Dubai World Cup.
John M. Oxx is a retired Irish trainer of thoroughbred racehorses. By the end of the 2009 season Oxx had trained 35 Group One winners over his career, including the winners of 11 Classic races. He is best known as the trainer of Sinndar and Sea The Stars.
Wayne Danforth Wright was an American Hall of Fame and National Champion Thoroughbred horse racing jockey who won all three of the Triple Crown races in different years.
Frank Catrone, Jr. was an American thoroughbred horse racing jockey, who is best known for winning the 1965 Kentucky Derby as a trainer.
Bold Venture was an American Thoroughbred racehorse that won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes.
Donau (1907–1913) was an American Thoroughbred racehorse and was the winner of the 1910 Kentucky Derby. Donau was known for his often temperamental and difficult personality, which led to him being gelded at the end of 1910. Donau started in 111 races over his three-year flat racing career and was in the process of being retrained for steeplechasing when he died at the age of six years in February 1913 at the Nashville farm of his owner William Gerst of the William Gerst Brewing Company.
Geoff Lewis is a Welsh retired jockey who was born in Talgarth, Breconshire.
Lord Avie was an American thoroughbred champion racehorse.
William Molter was an American National Champion and Hall of Fame horse trainer in the sport of Thoroughbred racing.
William B. Finnegan was an American Thoroughbred horse racing trainer.
Sodium (1963–1983) was an Irish-bred, British-trained Thoroughbred racehorse and sire best known for winning the classic St Leger Stakes in 1966. After running well without winning in 1965 he improved to become one of the best European colts of his generation in 1966 when he developed a rivalry with Charlottown. Sodium finished fourth behind Charlottown in The Derby but reversed the form to win both the Irish Derby and St Leger. He failed to reproduce his best form as a four-year-old and was retired to stud, where he had little success as a sire of winners in France and Japan.
Rushaway was an American Thoroughbred racehorse whose enduring legacy was his two Derby wins on consecutive days in two different states. Owned and trained by Alfred Tarn, in both races, Rushaway was ridden by Tarn's son-in-law, the future National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame inductee Johnny Longden. On Friday afternoon, May 22, 1936, Rushaway won the Illinois Derby at Aurora Downs in Aurora, Illinois. That night, Tarn shipped the three-year-old gelding three hundred miles south via express train to the Latonia Race Track in Latonia, Kentucky, where on Saturday afternoon he won the Latonia Derby. Rushaway's feat of endurance is still talked about more than eighty years later.
Leon "Buddy" Haas was a jockey in Thoroughbred horse racing who in 1941 was reported to be earning the highest salary of any jockey in the United States.
The 1928 Preakness Stakes was the 53rd running of the Preakness. The race took place on Friday, May 11, 1928, eight days before the Kentucky Derby making it the first leg of the U.S. Triple Crown series. A horse race for three-year-old thoroughbreds, it carried a total purse of $71,370. It was run on a track rated fast in a final time of 2:00 1/5. Ridden by future U.S. Racing Hall of Fame inductee Raymond Workman, Victorian won the race by a nose over runner-up Toro. Nassak, the betting favorite from the powerful Rancocas Stable finished a distant 11th. The fifth-place finisher, Sun Beau, went on to a brilliant racing career and was voted U.S. Champion Older Horse in three straight years culminating with his 1996 induction into the U.S. National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame.
Lester Anthony Balaski was an American Thoroughbred horse racing jockey, a soldier who served his country during World War II, and a founding director and a First Vice-President of the Jockeys' Guild who died as a result of injuries suffered in an August 22, 1964, racing accident at Agua Caliente Racetrack in Mexico. A resident of Chula Vista, California, he had been transported from the racetrack to Mercy Hospital in San Diego, California where he died ten days later.