There is a significant name missing from the entries this meet at Louisiana Downs: Morris Nicks. The 71-year-old, who won the local training title in 2011, retired in March. But he’s still following racing closely, particularly the career of champion Caledonia Road, who is scheduled to run Saturday at Belmont Park in the Grade 1 Acorn. Nicks’s son Ralph trains Caledonia Road. It was during the Louisiana Downs meet a year ago that Ralph called his father about Caledonia Road. “He said, ‘Dad, I’ve got a special filly. I wish you could see her,’” Nicks recalled. “That was last summer, her 2-year-old year. That was before she’d ever run. Ralph’s got a good eye. Even when he was a little kid. He’d get on horses every day before he went to school and he picked it up, having a good eye on things.” Caledonia Road won her career debut in September at Saratoga and later captured the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies to lock up the Eclipse Award for outstanding 2-year-old filly of 2017. Morris Nicks was unable to be at the Breeders’ Cup, but made a point to be at the Eclipse Awards alongside Ralph. “I can’t explain how special it was,” Morris Nicks said. “I can’t put it into words.” Morris Nicks said health issues forced him to retire from training at the close of the Fair Grounds. “I felt like it was time to hang it up,” he said. “I didn’t feel like I could do my clients justice.” Nicks now spends his time between homes in Texas and Louisiana. “Occasionally, I go see Ralph – more than I could before,” he said of his son, who is based in New York and Florida. Morris Nicks grew up on a Texas farm, and was introduced to racing at another farm about a mile from his home, where he first galloped horses and later rode match races. At the age of 17, he spent a summer at Ruidoso Downs. “It grew on me,” he said. “I’m an animal person, and I always just loved racing.” Nicks took out a trainer’s license at the age of 18 at Oaklawn, back in the 1960s. “The called me ‘The Kid’ at Oaklawn,” he said with a laugh. “I did not have a win the first year at Oaklawn. I remember that. I had a lot of seconds. I had one filly that ran four seconds.” Nicks believes his first win came the next meet at Oaklawn. He continued to race in Arkansas for much of his career, and also was longtime regular in Kentucky and Louisiana. Nicks won graded stakes with Golden Sonata and Run Johnny. His long list of stakes winners also includes such names as Groovy Jett, Northern Scene, Pure Tactics, Rhonda Legs, and Smitty’s Sunshine. “Smitty’s Sunshine was a neat little mare,” Nicks said. “She won six races in a row and five of them were $100,000 stakes. Five in a row! She was a good one.” Smitty’s Sunshine, a Louisiana-bred, retired with earnings of $532,219. Nicks also was a mentor to Tim Ice, the trainer who won the 2009 Belmont Stakes with eventual champion Summer Bird. Nicks, upon his retirement, was feted in a winner’s circle ceremony on March 31 at Fair Grounds. “They named a race for me that day,” he said. “It was very special. “Racing was good to me.”