Preakness Stakes: Janney finding himself in demand at Pimlico

BALTIMORE – Visiting the backside at Pimlico Race Course Preakness week is nothing new for Stuart Janney III, who lives only a few miles away in a town named Butler.

Visiting the backside at Pimlico Race Course Preakness week as the co-owner/breeder of a Kentucky Derby winner is certainly a unique experience for the 64-year-old Janney.

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Janney was on the Pimlico backside early Thursday, bouncing from one interview to the next for the local morning news shows just prior to watching Derby winner Orb gallop for the first time at Pimlico.

“I’ve been coming to mornings at Pimlico Thursday and Friday most of my life,” said Janney, who co-owns Orb with his cousin Ogden Mills Phipps. “I had a lot of horses that raced in Maryland with Charlie Hadry. They were stabled at Laurel but raced at Pimlico an awful lot, so it’s nice to be back here.”

Janney said he hasn’t had much time to celebrate Orb’s Derby victory. As the chairman of the board of Bessemer Trust, a wealth management and investment firm, Janney has been on the road the last 10 days at meetings, making two trips to Texas and two to New York.

“I don’t think the people at Bessemer want to suddenly see their chairman is all of a sudden entirely engrossed in some horse,” said Janney, who returned to his Maryland home Wednesday at 9.

Janney has not run a horse in the Preakness. In 1998, he had the morning-line favorite, Coronado’s Quest, who had to scratch with a sore right hind foot the day before the race.

On Thursday, Janney was happy to see Orb doing so well two days before this year’s Preakness.

“I hope he’s doing just fine because my son got on a flight from Hong Kong [this morning], so it’s a long way to come if we have to scratch,” Janney said.