Wilson's plan pays off with tremendous start at meet

Shane Wilson has won the last three training titles at Louisiana Downs. His ascendance in Bossier City now has cut kitty-corner across Louisiana to New Orleans.

Through Sunday, Wilson had 15 Fair Grounds winners, nine more than Joe Sharp, whose six winners rank second among Fair Grounds trainers. Wilson’s volume of runners has been as surprising as his winners: Just 17 days into the 2023-24 season, Wilson already had 80 starters, 35 more than the next-highest total.

Wilson used the gap between the end of the Louisiana Downs meeting in mid-September and the start of Fair Grounds in mid-November to line up his stable.

“We’re conscious that when Churchill ends [in late November] and those guys start settling in, the meet gets harder,” Wilson said. “It was my plan to have everybody ready, spots all picked out, and get what we could as soon as we could.”

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More broadly, Wilson, 52, has put together a career year during 2023 with 88 winners through Dec. 17, seven more than his previous high of 81 in 2022. His $2.36 million in stable earnings is roughly $720,000 higher than last year’s peak.

It has not always been so.

Wilson, who mucked stalls for Hall of Famer Jack van Berg as a teenager, spent seven years as an assistant to trainer Sam David before opening his own stable in 1998. After a 1-for-41 year in 2005, Wilson, with a wife and two young sons, left the track, taking a sales job in Texas. While Wilson left racing, racing did not loosen its grip on Wilson, who returned to training in 2007, moving his family to Lafayette, La., home of Evangeline Downs and a manageable distance from Delta Downs. During the Delta meet, Wilson would arise at 3 a.m. to make the 90-minute drive from Lafayette to Vinton. His first year back, Wilson went 1 for 67. His 2009 season was equally discouraging, with five wins from 155 starts.

After 2009, Wilson’s foothold continuously strengthened, though Fair Grounds success eluded him. Racing sparingly in New Orleans most winters, Wilson won just nine races from 166 Fair Grounds starters between 2008 and 2020. He has exceeded in one month his win total over a dozen years.

Wilson’s younger son, Connor, 20, is taking online college classes while serving as a key assistant in the barn. “He does all the shipping and takes care of a lot of the day-to-day stuff. It’s taken a lot of the load off me and is a big reason we’ve done this well,” Wilson said.

Wilson has 45 horses at Fair Grounds and 55 more training at Louisiana Downs, his stable heavy on claiming stock and Louisiana-breds. This past May, Wilson started working for Louisiana powerhouse Brittlyn Stables and now trains all the Brittlyn horses. That association produced two Louisiana Champions Day winners, Behemah Star in the Turf and Ova Charged in the Ladies Sprint.

Wilson’s career has unfolded at nothing like a sprint pace. He’s hit full stride now.

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