Puhich and his old warhorse Background continue to fight on
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Trainer Michael Puhich was hospitalized with a faulty liver on Sept. 21, 2024, when his world got even worse.
One of his grooms called Puhich at the hospital to tell him that Background, a 7-year-old barn favorite who mounted a furious rally in deep stretch to win the 2021 Longacres Mile at Emerald Downs, had been claimed for $32,000 by Steve Asmussen.
“It was heartbreaking,” recalled Puhich. “He was my buddy. It was like losing one of your kids.”
Puhich didn’t have much time to mourn the loss of his favorite gelding, as the trainer was in a literal fight for his life as he prepared for a liver transplant with financial support from an online campaign mounted by his fellow horsemen.
“I was really, really sick for two years,” Puhich said. “It was just a living hell, to be honest with you. I got to a point where I was ready to go and, fortunately, we were lucky to get the right match. The support that I got and the people that donated in the GoFundMe – I look back on all that and all the love and care.
“People say I went through a rough time, but now I’m looking back at it, and it might have been the best two years of my life. I found out what real friends were and just how caring people can be. People in the hospital, they’re as big of heroes as the 9/11 firefighters. Not to get too religious, but I definitely got closer to God and appreciate life so much more.”
Prior to his illness, Puhich trained racehorses while holding down a job at the Pegasus Training Center in Redmond, Wash. Once he got healthy, he faced a choice between finding a new career at age 62 or, as he put it, “going about $40,000 in debt and starting from ground zero as a horse trainer.”
“This is my dream, so I went $40,000 in the hole,” said Puhich.
That outlay included the purchase of a familiar face: a now-9-year-old Background, last seen finishing fourth in a $5,000 claiming race at Fair Grounds on March 14. Puhich had received word that the horse’s connections were thinking of shipping him to Will Rogers Downs in Oklahoma to race, so he offered to buy Background with the intention of retiring him.
Puhich’s attempt to purchase his old pal was successful. His effort to retire him, not so much, as Background is the 8-5 morning-line favorite in Sunday’s one-mile seventh race, a $10,000 starter allowance with a $14,000 purse and a field of six.
“I sent him to Kentucky and my friend said, ‘You need to ship him out to your stable [at Emerald]. He’s doing really good,’ ”explained Puhich. “If he was doing this good the day he won the Longacres Mile, he’d have broken the track record. I haven’t seen him this good in a long time, but if he doesn’t run well, that’s his last race. But I’ll be surprised if he doesn’t run really, really well.
“He’s a motivation for the barn. He’s kind of like the veteran in the locker room with a Super Bowl ring.”
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As Puhich envisions it, “in a perfect dream world,” Background would win Sunday’s race, come back to win another one six weeks later, then gallop off into the sunset with a second Longacres Mile crown on Aug. 16.
“That’s the movie,” said Puhich.
To star in such a film, the 9-year-old, who has four wins from 13 starts at a mile in his career, will need to top a well-matched field of routers who have flashed recent form at least as good as Background’s.
While his Longacres Mile victory came from well off the pace, Background typically likes to race on or near the lead. Breaking from post 2 on Sunday under top jockey Kevin Krigger, he’ll have speed to his immediate inside and outside in Baby Waylon and No Ordinary Tiger, with the closer Afjan capable of picking up the pieces from the far outside if those three burn each other up.
“I’m gonna just have Kevin let him break and let him settle wherever he wants to be,” said Puhich. “If he breaks running, he’s doing better right now than his last four or five races. If he wants to show speed, shame on them if they try to eyeball him, because he’s a warrior.”
Like trainer, like horse.
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