Pearson building his own equine empire

DEL MAR, Calif. – This is the type of summer Deron Pearson has dreamed of for nearly 35 years.

As a teenager in the early 1980s, Pearson was an avid racing fan, attending Del Mar with his family. By the mid-1990s, his telephone communications business was successful enough for him to buy a share in a racehorse. Through the years, his involvement in ownership grew, and when he sold his business, which had evolved into information technology and software, Pearson’s investment in racing soared.

Pearson, 50, does not have just a few horses in training. He has a growing empire, with a many as 70 runners at Southern California tracks and another 50 broodmares, weanlings, and yearlings in California and Kentucky.

“This is what I hoped for,” Pearson said on a recent morning in the Del Mar stables. “It took a while to build the capital to do this.”

In the past year, Pearson has had his first million-dollar win – the Delta Downs Jackpot Stakes with Ocho Ocho Ocho last November – and has watched Prize Exhibit develop into a leading 3-year-old turf filly this summer with stakes wins at Del Mar and Santa Anita.

Saturday at Del Mar, Prize Exhibit will try to win the first Grade 1 race of her career in the $300,000 Del Mar Oaks at 1 1/8 miles on turf. She goes into the race as a leading contender on the basis of her win in the Grade 2 San Clemente Handicap at a mile here July 19.

“I think she’s better now,” Pearson said. “I don’t think anyone can touch her at a mile and an eighth.”

In the last few years, Pearson has dedicated more time to racing and less to business, a move prompted by the private sale of his company. He declined to disclose the purchase price of the company, Nexus, to Dimension Data in April 2014.

The sale of a company, which Pearson helped found and continues to work for, has given him financial freedom. Last September at Keeneland, Pearson bought 18 yearlings for a total of $3.84 million, according to sale company records. At the Barretts paddock sale at Del Mar last month, Pearson bought the 2-year-old French import Mr. Notorious for $200,000, the highest price of the sale.

Pearson, a divorced father of two girls, said the sale of Nexus has changed his financial approach to racing.

“You have flexibility,” he said. “The money is in the bank.”

With the stable’s growth, Pearson moved from focusing on European race-ready horses to yearlings. Aside from Prize Exhibit, Pearson’s foreign purchases include Full Ransom, who won the Grade 3 Miesque Stakes at Hollywood Park in 2013, and Yahilwa, who won the Grade 3 Sixty Sails Handicap at Hawthorne in April.

Most of the horses he buys – private or at sales – have pedigrees that emphasize stamina.

“I don’t like to buy sprinters, but they may evolve into that,” Pearson said.

So far, none of his 2014 yearling purchases have scored a splashy win. Jim Cassidy, who trains for Pearson, tends to emphasize 2-year-old races in late summer or autumn.

“Jim hasn’t pushed them,” Pearson said. “I’m not buying precocious horses. I’ll know more by the end of the year.”

By then, Pearson’s life will have changed a bit. He says he will leave Nexus at the end of the year and is unsure what he will do next.

“If I do something, it will be different,” he said. “I think I’ll take it easy.”

He does not have to be in a hurry. There are plenty of racehorses to follow.