For over 50 years, D. Wayne Lukas set the standard in horse racing. And the sport followed suit. Trainers wanted to be like Wayne. Owners wanted him handling their horses.
He died Saturday at his home in Louisville, Kentucky, his family announced through Churchill Downs on Sunday. He was 89.
Lukas’ death, mourned across the racing industry, came just days after his family said he would no longer train because of health issues. He was hospitalized with a severe MRSA infection and declined an aggressive treatment plan, instead choosing to return home.
His stable of horses was transferred to his longtime assistant Sebastian Nicholl.
Lukas’ 4,953rd and final thoroughbred winner was Tour Player at Churchill Downs on June 12. His final Kentucky Derby runner finished 16th in May.
There are generations who’ve never known horse racing without Lukas in it. Much of what American trainers do today is based on his playbook: identifying and buying the best horses at the sales, shipping them to race at tracks nationwide, aiming to compete yearly in what he called “the big arena” — the Triple Crown series and the Breeders’ Cup world championships.
“The horses were everything to Wayne. They were his life,” one-time rival trainer and longtime friend Bob Baffert posted on X. “From the way he worked them, how he cared for them, and how he maintained his shed row as meticulously as he did his horses. No detail was too small. Many of us got our graduate degrees in training by studying how Wayne did it. Behind his famous shades, he was a tremendous horseman, probably the greatest who ever lived.”
Born and raised on a small farm in Antigo, Wisconsin, Lukas grew up around horses. He first coached high school basketball in his home state, later serving as an assistant at the University of Wisconsin.
In 1968, Lukas moved to California and began training quarter horses. He found success, overseeing 24 world champions in 10 years. He then switched to thoroughbreds, saddling his first winner at Santa Anita in 1977. He became the first trainer to earn over $100 million in purse money, and 14 times he led the nation in money won.
“A lot of nice records fell and a lot of good things happened,” he said in 2022.
Lukas had an edge to him in his heyday, cutting a suave figure at the track in his expensive suits, his eyes hidden behind aviator sunglasses. He ran his operation like a corporate CEO, overseeing some 400 horses around the country. There was no time to rest on his laurels. He was never content to appreciate what he had achieved. Instead, he was always looking for the next great horse, the next big stakes win.
His statistics are overwhelming:
— 15 Triple Crown race victories, including six in a row
— 20 Breeders’ Cup victories
— three Horse of the Year champions
— four Eclipse Awards as the nation’s outstanding trainer
— first trainer to be inducted in both the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame and the American Quarter Horse Hall of Fame
Nearly until his final days, Lukas would be aboard his stable pony, Bucky, in the predawn darkness, leading his horses to the track and supervising their workouts. Out of the saddle, he was easily spotted in his white Stetson, using a cane in one of his few concessions to age.
Some years ago, though, the glory days seemed lost and never to return. A handful of Lukas’ deep-pocketed owners died within a short time of each other, leaving his stock of horseflesh depleted.
He wasn’t a serious factor in the Kentucky Derby, Preakness and Belmont.
In 2020, he recovered from a case of COVID-19.
Still, he kept getting up at 3:30 a.m., spending winters in Arkansas and springs in Kentucky. He returned to the 2-year-old sales, scouting promising horses that he could develop his way.
He also trained for MyRacehorse, a syndicate selling shares in horses for as little as $100. Lukas marveled at the logjam of happy owners in the winner’s circle.
The tide soon turned. In 2022, Lukas earned his record-tying fifth victory in the Kentucky Oaks and first since 1990. He became the oldest trainer to win a Triple Crown race when Seize the Grey won the 2024 Preakness and followed up with a victory in the $1 million Pennsylvania Derby.
On that May afternoon in Baltimore, there was an impromptu surge of adulation for Lukas from his rivals. In a business rife with jealousy, the losers stepped up to congratulate the wily veteran.
Lukas lived to a ripe old age, long enough to experience the reverence he had earned and so richly deserved.
“No one was bigger to this Game Except for Wayne,” retired Hall of Fame jockey Gary Stevens wrote on X.
Over his last 25 years, Lukas had segued into racing’s elder stateman, unafraid to express his opinions about an industry struggling to stay afloat within its ranks and with the public.
“With age and experience you inherit a certain amount of responsibility to maybe carry the game a little further,” he told The Associated Press in 2015.
Lukas had been there, done that and knew the feeling of winning. He wanted to share it with his newest owners as well as total strangers. He would often pull youngsters out of the stands and usher them to the winner’s circle to pose for the photo.
The man nicknamed “Coach” took fatherly pride in his string of former assistants who went on to successful careers of their own, most notably Todd Pletcher, a two-time Kentucky Derby winner.
“Wayne had a special aura about him,” Baffert posted on X. “He had a knack for making others feel seen and valued. He was uniquely charming and an eternal optimist. In one of my last conversations with him, we talked about the importance of looking at the glass half full and continuing to compete in what he called the big arena. To his final days, he was a relentless competitor. He set out with ambitious goals and achieved them all.”
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AP horse racing: https://apnews.com/hub/horse-racing
