For Baffert and Lukas, respect has bloomed into friendship

BALTIMORE – Theirs has become a mutual-admiration society, and a very exclusive one at that. Bob Baffert and D. Wayne Lukas have returned to Pimlico this week to take another shot at the Preakness, and a win by either would tie a record that has stood for 130 years.

Baffert and Lukas each has won the Preakness six times, just one shy of the record for trainers held by R. Wyndham Walden. The last Preakness win for Walden came in 1888, or well before the Black-Eyed Susan became the official Preakness drink or anyone had ever dreamed up a creature named Kegasus.

As the trainer of Kentucky Derby winner Justify, Baffert clearly stands the better chance to tie Walden when the 143rd Preakness is run Saturday. Nonetheless, he is deferential and respectful when anyone mentions him in the same breath with Lukas, whether it’s in the context of horse racing or tiddlywinks.

“Wayne Lukas, he is legendary,” Baffert started off last week in response to a question posted on a national teleconference. “He is legendary. He’s always set the bar, you know.”

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Lukas will saddle longshots Bravazo and Sporting Chance in this Preakness. It was five years ago that Lukas was similarly dismissed coming into the Preakness, but Oxbow, a 15-1 shot, gave him not only his sixth Preakness win, but also a record 14th in a Triple Crown event, surpassing the standard set in 1957 by Sunny Jim Fitzsimmons.

Lukas believes, however, that his record could be short-lived. The Derby triumph by Justify gave Baffert his 13th in a Triple Crown race.

Baffert is “the heir apparent to all these records,” said Lukas. “I mean, someone asked me about the 14 Triple Crown races and so forth. Bob is going to roll right past that.”

Their career arcs are a lot alike but don’t precisely overlap, owing to their difference in age. Lukas, who turns 83 in September, had a very early retirement as a basketball coach in his native Wisconsin – hence the familiar reference to him as “The Coach” – before turning to Quarter Horse racing, then to Thoroughbreds. His first Thoroughbred career win came in 1974 at Pomona.

Baffert, 65, grew up in Arizona and also traces his racing origins to the Quarter Horse game, briefly at first as a jockey, then a trainer. He, too, found Thoroughbreds to be more lucrative after moving to Southern California in the 1980s, with his first major breakthrough coming when Thirty Slews won the 1992 Breeders’ Cup Sprint at Gulfstream Park.

In the years that have passed, both men have become known as benchmarks for the training profession.

Lukas, inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1999, has more than 4,800 wins – including a record 20 in the Breeders’ Cup – and $278 million in stable earnings. His feats and contributions to the sport have been so monumental that in 2013 he was honored with the Eclipse Award of Merit.

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Baffert, inducted into the Hall in 2009, has more than 2,800 wins and nearly $275 million in stable earnings. In a game that longed for a Triple Crown winner for nearly four decades, he became the one to end the drought with American Pharoah in 2015.

Through it all, both have become something of a rarity, being widely recognized by the sporting public outside the entrance gates to a racetrack. Their widespread fame is due in no small part to engaging personalities that complement their incredible accomplishments.

When Baffert first began infringing on Lukas’s territory in the 1990’s – at one point, they shared Bob and Beverly Lewis and other deep-pocketed owners as clients – their relationship could best be described as contentious. In the press or at racing functions, they would occasionally jab each other – good-naturedly or otherwise – but as both became more secure with their legacies, those petty snipes faded into oblivion.

Now the relationship manifests itself with kind words and overt gestures. If Baffert wins Saturday, it’s 1-9 that Lukas will be among those rushing to congratulate him – and vice versa.

“The one thing that you quickly find out is who you can greatly respect, and respect is what really starts to bond these friendships that we develop over the years,” said Lukas. “I have the greatest respect for Bob. Bob is an excellent horseman, and I’ve been telling some people that not only has he got a good clientele base and gets some nice horses, but he absolutely knows what to do with them.

“I have developed a deep friendship and respect with him and his whole family for the simple reason that I think he’s a very good horseman and he does a very, very good job.”

Baffert, on Lukas: “He changed Quarter Horse racing and he changed Thoroughbred racing. Everywhere he goes, he changes it. His work ethic is just second to none. To me, he is still above me. He’s an icon and he’s the man.

“We’ve become good friends, because we have a lot in common. We had a lot of Quarter Horse stories and friends that we knew coming up. So, it’s been a lot of fun. But you know what? He is still a great horseman and he knows what’s going around. He’s sharp. He’s still really, really sharp.”