![](\"https:\/\/cdnb-media.myracehorse.com\/blog\/image\/IMG20220814WA0003_1661871622935.jpg\")
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In a rare moment of not being in perpetual motion, the high-energy Kent Sweezey sat in a golf cart outside his Saratoga barn earlier this summer to discuss his training career, now in its sixth year.<\/p>\n
Sweezey, 36, joined our team earlier in 2022 and to date has trained three winners for MyRacehorse \u2014\u00a0Carrothers<\/strong>,\u00a0Daddy\u2019s Joy<\/strong>, and\u00a0Tap the Gavel<\/strong>. These horses are part of a tremendous summer that Kent is enjoying with a multitude of winners, up and down the East Coast. In the time period of Aug. 15th-28th, the trainer connected with 8 winners from 20 starters, including Daddy\u2019s Joy at Monmouth Park this past Saturday, for a solid win rate of 40%.<\/p>\n Yet there was a time earlier in his career when the victories were decidedly more staggered because he simply didn\u2019t have the number of horses in his barn to generate wins on a regular basis, like he does now.<\/p>\n After working in the barns of Christophe Clement, Eoin Harty, and Jimmy Jerkens (the son of Hall of Famer Allen Jerkens), Sweezey hung his own shingle in 2017. But the phone wasn\u2019t ringing off the hook at the start, despite some help in getting horses from Clement and Jerkens, plus an assist from his parents, Wayne and Cathy Sweezey, for whom he saddled his first winner, Lela\u2019s Gift, at Churchill Downs on May 25th, 2017. A moment that he recalls feeling like he had won the \u201cKentucky Derby\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cI wanted to come into the barn and have 15 horses, all maiden, allowance, and stakes horses,\u201d Sweezey said looking back on the early days of his training career. \u201cThat\u2019s just not going to happen. It just doesn\u2019t happen that way. When the phone wasn\u2019t ringing, I took the money I had and went and claimed some horses.<\/p>\n \u201cThe people I worked for, Eoin Harty, Christophe Clement, and Jimmy Jerkens were not claiming trainers, so I didn\u2019t know what I was doing, but it was trial by error and we did pretty good with some horses,\u201d he added. \u201cThe old school things that Jimmy did are the things that work on any horse. Just by paying close attention to them, doing the right thing by them, like taking them out [to graze] in the afternoon, turned some claiming horses around for us. Once you win a couple of races that\u2019s when people notice. I got a lot of exposure for winning races that were seen on TVG. Nobody cares that it\u2019s a $16,000 claimer, there\u2019s still high-fives in the winner\u2019s circle and that\u2019s the thrill of owning a horse.\u201d<\/p>\n In his first full year of training in 2018, Sweezey won 24 races from 191 starters. Last year he had his best season yet, 63 trips to the winner\u2019s circle from 444 starters. What started as a handful of horses, now represents sizable divisions in South Florida and Monmouth Park, plus a handful of horses he brought to Saratoga for the first time this year. In all, Sweezey currently has approximately 75 horses in his care. Recently, he began training a fourth horse for MRH,\u00a0Moonbow \u201920,<\/strong>\u00a0a yet-to-be-named daughter of 2017 Belmont Stakes winner Tapwrit who was acquired earlier this year by our bloodstock team at Fasig-Tipton\u2019s Midlantic Two-Year-Olds In Training Sale.<\/p>\n Sweezey learned the business from a different angle while growing up on the Kentucky farm, Timber Town Stable, owned by his parents. Wayne and Cathy are renowned for their horsemanship skills in raising Thoroughbreds and acting as a consignors for their clients at elite sales. Owner Mandy Pope, notorious for acquiring high-priced broodmares, is one of their clients. The Pope-owned standout mares, Songbird and Havre de Grace \u2014 whose combined sales\u2019 prices as broodmare prospects was a staggering $19.5 million \u2014 reside at Timber Town.<\/p>\n Sweezey said learning the ropes of raising young horses on the farm boils down to being attentive to the horse, not unlike his job now as a trainer, but being hands-on as part of the formative years of a racehorse, doesn\u2019t carry the sense of longevity that training horses does.<\/p>\n \u201cI have a unique perspective on the business from growing up on the farm,\u201d he shared. \u201cI know the importance of a filly being well-bred and trying to get black-type for her or maybe just breaking her maiden.<\/p>\n \u201cFor my dad, the highlight of his year will be to sell a big horse in Saratoga \u2014 that\u2019s your Grade 1, that\u2019s your Derby, to see a horse sell for a $1 million,\u201d he added. \u201cBut once the horse leaves the ring, that [chapter] is done. Being a trainer . . . this is the end game and it\u2019s cool to be a part of that.\u201d<\/p>\n Shortly after he began his career in the spring of 2017, Sweezey earned his first stakes victory with a horse he claimed off Brad Cox for his father and a friend of his dad\u2019s. It\u2019s no easy feat to claim a horse off Cox and proceed to win a stakes race with the horse in its next start, but that\u2019s what Sweezey did with Western Reserve, a $62,500 claim who won the listed Warriors Veterans Stakes in Indiana. Subsequently, Western Reserve would give the trainer his first graded placing in the Grade 2 Autumn Stakes at Woodbine. A horse, Phat Man, that Sweezey acquired at a horses of racing age sale in 2019 for $65,000 became his first graded stakes winner with his victory in the Grade 3 Fred Hooper Stakes at Gulfstream Park in 2020. The trainer has also gained recognition for his work with Epic Bromance who finished second in this year\u2019s Grade 1 United Nations Stakes after finishing third in the race the year prior.<\/p>\n Sweezey\u2019s horsemanship skills are equally matched by his charisma and enthusiasm. He\u2019s been the ideal fit for MRH because he understands the importance of making a connection with the partners. Our owners are very appreciative of his frequent communications and the fun and lively manner in which he delivers his messages through selfie videos with the horses.<\/p>\n \u201cI try to treat my owners all the same whether they\u2019ve got the best horse in the barn or they\u2019ve got the cheapest claimer I have,\u201d Sweezey said. \u201cI think [MyRacehorse] is the future of racing. I like taking all the videos and showing off the horse. I like when people come to the races and enjoy high-fiving when we win or run well. It\u2019s a very awesome experience for me.\u201d<\/p>\n As the conversation with Sweezey winds down, it\u2019s evident that the trainer is itching to spring into action \u2014 maybe it\u2019s to get on the phone to enter a horse or to catch a plane to Florida to see his division there \u2014 but this much is clear: Sweezey is a trainer on the rise with a bottomless reserve of energy and very determined to be the best at what he does. We\u2019re extremely proud to have him on our team.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In a rare moment of not being in perpetual motion, the high-energy Kent Sweezey sat in a golf cart outside his Saratoga barn earlier this summer to discuss his training career, now in its sixth year. Sweezey, 36, joined our team earlier in 2022 and to date has trained three winners for MyRacehorse \u2014\u00a0Carrothers,\u00a0Daddy\u2019s Joy, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[81],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3365","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cumberland-falls"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/18.236.35.81\/fincalarosina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3365","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/18.236.35.81\/fincalarosina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/18.236.35.81\/fincalarosina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/18.236.35.81\/fincalarosina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/18.236.35.81\/fincalarosina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3365"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/18.236.35.81\/fincalarosina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3365\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3367,"href":"http:\/\/18.236.35.81\/fincalarosina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3365\/revisions\/3367"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/18.236.35.81\/fincalarosina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3365"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/18.236.35.81\/fincalarosina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3365"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/18.236.35.81\/fincalarosina\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3365"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}