West Point, McLaughlin split
 

The end of the Saratoga meet also brought an end to the successful working relationship between Terry Finley's West Point Thoroughbreds and trainer Kiaran McLaughlin.

At the request of McLaughlin, who is seeking to downsize his stable somewhat, West Point has moved 21 horses, splitting them between trainers Tom Albertrani and Mike Hushion. An additional horse, Justwhistledixie, was transferred to Bill Mott. Lewis Lakin, a longtime Mott client, has a 40 percent ownership interest in Justwhistledixie.

McLaughlin said his primary clients, the Maktoum families that run both the Darley and Shadwell outifts, have increased the number of horses they send to him.

"Just trying to get my numbers in order,'' said McLaughlin, who prefers to keep around 120 horses, but was up to 140. "[West Point] is great for the game. They brought a lot of good people into the game. It was a tough decision. We had a lot of nice horses for them and have done well.''

McLaughlin has trained for West Point since 2002 and has won major stakes for the group with the likes of Seattle Fitz, Lear's Princess, Flashy Bull, and Justwhistledixie.

"We wish him the best,'' Finley said of McLaughlin. "He's a great guy. He and his team are top notch.''

Finley said there were several reasons he chose to split up his New York horses between Hushion and Albertrani.

"Both are really good communicators, and get the concept of a partnership model,'' Finley said. "Both I think are world-class horsemen. Put those together and we're very comfortable.''

Among the notable West Point horses, Mr. Fantasy, who is still on the farm, will be going to Hushion while Flat Bold will go to Albertrani.

http://drf.com/news/article/107143.html

NT

first Rick Violette now Kiaran , how long will hushion and albertrani last ?, is terry finley going to get his trainer license next?

Good point, I figured it was worth discussing considering even a trainer who desperately wants to get rid of some stock doesn't ditch an owner who is willing to spend money on horses. There's more to the story.

NT

Either that or maybe some pinstripes

my opinion on this is that the west point horses are put in positions that the trainers do not want to run in (they are aggressivly placed). trainers work for the owners , the owners of west point though many do not have a vote on where the horses are run , that decision is left to the general partner Mr Finley and maybe some close advisors. while terry has been good in bringing new people to the game some of the placement of his horses can be questioned ....some of these horses are placed in on big days when the big crowds will be at the track and the marketing machine can be out in full force to recurit new owners who may be at the track that day , what other marketing tool is as great as having a live horse on a big stakes day to show to poetential clients ....i can't think of any

a key west point employee has left and gone to another stable as well in the last few months (soverign stable)

i'm sure steve could get terry on the show to answer any questions everythng else is pure speculation

It's going to be interesting watching Albertrani run them into the ground.

And I am sure if that ever happened we would hear the god for honest truth

steve can ask the tough questions, the listeners can determine if Terry is just blowing smoke or answering them with some sense of the truth

doubt it happens though and not from any lack of effort on steve's part

Beat me to it.

I'm sure there is more to the story than KMc wanting to downsize, but you're not going to get the rest of the story from either side.

I think you're very on point here.

tricky, b/c were'nt the sheiks the majority buyers at this years sales, i assume they're gonna ship a lot more business his way?

D. Wayne Lukas could use some stock:eek:

-bt-

hushin is a good choice..

I dont for the life of me understand these West Point " investors", as Finley refers to them.
Alot of them are putting up major coin to purchase a piece of a horse that has been doubled in price on the buy-in. If an owner is looking to get into the game and has a 100k-200k as a budget, they could get so much more for their money on their own with a capable horseman. Whether that be thru buying at a sale or high end claims.
Granted they are responsible for 100% of the training bills but, they get the lions share of the winnings. People can say that WP has been great for the game and all that but, they arent doing clients any favors.
Hats off to Terry Finley, he is playing this great game on a very high level on someone else money and all the while getting filthy rich.

Mclaughlin is having by far the worst year of his career from an ROI standpoint on the betting dollar.

He showed a flat bet profit in 9 out of 12 years from '96 through '07.

This year he's losing at double the takeout on dirt - and not doing much better on turf. A combo of his name getting too big and his horses not producing as well as in many years past.

He was brutal with the babies debuting at the Spa. Like 1-17. A usual strong suit for him.
However, almost all of them were breed to run long.

The well-heeled prospective owner only needs to get in touch with Ken McPeek. He'll find them a future HOY.

DrugS, while I am sure your stats are right, remember that owners don't care about ROI when they are running in G1 races. WPT cares about win percentage in allowance and stakes races. VOLJACK is right about his babies this summer but when asked prior to the meet McLaughlin said he doubted he'd have a shot at a repeat of his title. He didn't think he had the stock. Alot of those Stonerside bred Darley babies are bred for 2 turns and a 3yo campaign.

WPT has very high markups and though they have had alot of success, if you get in on the wrong horse you are quickly out of money and have to start over.

That option out weighs WPT 20-1 on value.
McPeek charges 5% on sale purchases..WPT charges 100%

WPT was always expensive (mark-ups, management fees etc) but when they stepped up and started buying 7 figure horses at the sales they knocked out all but a few "investors." The 100% or so markup was high, but could cover those that never made it to syndication when they were buying horses in the $100k range.

If you can afford to put several hundred thousand into a minor share of 1 horse, you could do far better in many other approaches to the game.

I know alot of folks dislike McPeek, but he has selected many very nice horses including Einstein and Curlin over the last few years. In retrospect, paying a 5% commission on $57k for Curlin looks like a better deal than anything WPT has had on offer.

I never said that his ROI stats had anything to do with any of this involving West Point. I'm sure it didn't.

Just pointing out that his production versus expectation has sunk to without a doubt rock bottom of his entire training career.

That for a guy who untill last year, year in and year out since he first started training, was at the very top of all trainers throughout the country on that type of measurement.

He's admitted that he is having a less than stellar year, by his own standard. The point was that ROI and winning percentage don't correspond. Unless an owner is a big bettor, ROI takes a back seat to wins. K McL has more for Darley now that they bought out the Stonerside stock and clearly that's usually a good way to make money and win races. The problem is that if any of them are really good, they get exiled to Dubai and go to Rick Mettee when they get back. If they come back bad, McLaughlin gets them back...
Hushion is a very good trainer and his barn was once known as a "betting" barn, esp. when Barry Schwartz was his main client.

ROI is without question a much better gauge of how skilled a trainer is than win percentage. It's not even remotely close. But If a trainers reputation becomes too strong it becomes harder to keep the ROI up. If a trainer is not respected, it becomes easier to keep it up.

You are right that owners favor win percentage and virtually all have next to no understanding of ROI. Which is why win percentage becomes a far more important gauge for trainers. Guys like Jamie Ness can win at 32% and still have one of the absolute best ROI's in the land.

It's not just trainers ... a jockey agent should carefully pick and choose to manage his win percentage. Even if it means just riding two or three races a week .. it's better than going out there on 10/1's and 15/1's and killing your riders percentages.

This is sincere, so please don't take it the wrong way. But, I was walking with/by/along side of KM a few times up at Saratoga. It looks like the MS is getting a bit worse for him. You can see it in his walk. That might be contributing to his desire to downsize.

My aunt has it and it's awful to watch people go through what MS does to you. He is an inspiration to many people.

From all accounts he is as classy and honest person as the game has.
I started following him real close around 2004-2005 back when you could get a good price on his runners. Hes an awesome trainer with any type of horse.

I say you can be a classy honest person and still medicate a horse improperly..What say u? I hope nothing but better health and a cure for MS for KM... With that said he is a friggin JUICER

What makes you say that? That he has a high win percentage? He also has some of the best stock out there.

His juice must not have been working well on the 2YOs at Saratoga.

I've heard many conspiracy theories and beliefs on trainers and McLaughlin has never been one that was ever mentioned as a juicer.

NT

Open your ears

OK, sure thing, care to share some of his great move-ups or accomplishments with horses he was juicing?

NT

I dont get the theory that every trainer that wins a quarter of their races or more are juicers/cheaters.
I do buy into the fact that all trainers that win less than 10% of their races are shitty trainers. Whether they are not putting their horses in the right spots or are bad caretakers, or a combination of both.
I put alot of stock into how horses look physically and by that you can usual find the good trainers. But I suppose you would say that it is the juice also.

If this is a challenge I will need to contact my consortium of colleagues that will be able to give you 30 examples. To me they are all blurrs, after I see 5 or 6 of the same thing I recognize that the deck is stacked. He is a juicer period

Not really impressed with West Point stock of horses. Cant remember one thier horses that they had that really imprssed me. I believe Macho Again is thier best horse they ever had.

Kiaran Mclaughlin is my favorite trainer and I hope he wins more stakes wins with the the Sheiks

Ok Muhammed will root right along side of YA..2 thumbs up.. Seattle Fitz was better

freddy you know at yonkers the girl in charge of the giveaways called her girlfriend and told her to be at this slot at 3:00 and the machine would pay off on the special giveaway prize. well it worked so well they tried it again and again and finally someone caught on that someone in the same family kept winning the prize now they are looking at 5 to 10 ... nice to know the higher ups were watching out for slot juciers

I sell give aways get me her #

973-245-1875

the cell number may not work as it probably hasn't been paid recently