O'Neill to have string at Oaklawn Park

Trainer Doug O’Neill will have a startup stable of sorts at the Oaklawn Park meet, which opens in January.

O’Neill said Little Rock, Ark.-based businessman Mark Schlesinger and partners will stable some horses with him at Oaklawn. O’Neill said he will not relocate horses from his existing stable in Southern California.

“We’re starting our own little string at Oaklawn and giving it a test,” O’Neill said Tuesday.

“A few weeks into the meet we should be pretty set in the 15 to 20 [horse] range. We’re going to bring a little bit of money to claim, too – have a little money there on the side to claim a few to run at that meet.”

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O’Neill, who has shipped in for stakes at Oaklawn, said he started to look at the possibility of a string at the Hot Springs, Ark., track after officials from Oaklawn came to visit horsemen at Santa Anita.

“They were just really pumping up their track,” O’Neill said.

O’Neill said that Schlesinger, who is a longtime friend, told him if he opened up shop at Oaklawn he and some of his partners would give him horses to train. Schlesinger introduced O’Neill to Paul Reddam, and together O’Neill and Reddam have won the Kentucky Derby twice, with I’ll Have Another and Nyquist.

“Our main base will continue to be Southern California,” O’Neill said. “We are excited about putting our toe in the water for the Oaklawn meet.”