Gullo switching hats from trainer to racing manager
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Trainer Gary Gullo will be retiring from training at the end of September to become racing manager for one of his longtime owners, Anthony Melfi.
Gullo, who began training in 1980, said the transition to racing manager from trainer will afford him a better quality of life.
“It’s time for me to transition in that direction because I’m working with somebody who’s good and who I have a lot of faith in,” said Gullo, 60. “I have confidence that everything is going to be better.”
Melfi, who has raced under the name Bob Peterson Stables, has renamed the stable GMP – Gullo, Melfi, and Peterson. The first two horses who raced under the stable name and in new silks ran Thursday at Saratoga, with Union Gables third in the off-the-turf P.G. Johnson Stakes and Big Q fourth in the Park Avenue division of the New York Stallion Stakes.
Union Gables was trained by Todd Pletcher, who will be getting several horses from Melfi. Gary Sciacca also will get some horses, Gullo said.
Melfi is trying to expand his presence and improve the quality of his operation both from the breeding and racing end. Melfi, who late last year sold his environmental services company to a New York City-based firm, has already purchased several mares for breeding and plans to attend the upcoming yearling sale in Kentucky.
“We bought three mares in November, they dropped three foals, they’re pregnant again,” Melfi said. “We’ll go again in November and buy three or four more mares. We’re going to this sale in Kentucky and hopefully pick up six or seven yearlings to flip over and pinhook and see what else we can come up with.
“The goal is really to look at the business and say, ‘Where can we make money and where are things going?’ ” Melfi added. “With the economy the way it is right now, you might be able to buy low right now. Can you sell high down the road?”
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Melfi said he recently claimed horses with Robertino Diodoro and those will race in Kentucky in the fall and winter in Oaklawn.
Gullo said he currently has 10 horses with Melfi and about 30 in total that will be dispersed by the end of September.
According to Equibase, Gullo won 813 races from 6,400 starters and his horses earned $22,233,391.
Among his better runners were listed stakes winners Jack On the Rocks, Hold that Prospect, Big Q, Dancewiththebride, T N T Red, and Wilburnmoney.