Red Dog ending 45-year training career
Oaklawn Park news feature by publicist Robert Yates (Gary Hartlage photo by Coady Media)
Trainer Gary “Red Dog” Hartlage’s one-horse stable will soon become a no-horse stable.
Hartlage, Louisville, said Sunday morning that the 2024-2025 Oaklawn meeting will be his last, ending a 45-year career highlighted by training titles in Kentucky and Arkansas, raucous celebrations following victories at Churchill Downs and campaigning the nationally prominent On Fire Baby, a millionaire multiple Grade 1 winner.
Oaklawn’s meeting concludes May 3.
“It’s just time,” Hartlage, 78, said as he observed a tacked-up Harleezy in his stall before training hours. “The game’s changed so much. I ain’t got the zip to go out and keep doing it. I’m good. I’m going out good.”
Hartlage has carried only two horses, Harleezy and Star Nation, for most of the last 18 months. Hartlage said his decision to retire was made after Star Nation ran eighth for a $10,000 claiming tag Jan. 17 at Oaklawn. Hartlage said Star Nation, a 5-year-old Alternation gelding, was given to the Arkansas Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation, which facilitates second careers for Oaklawn-raced or trained horses upon retirement. Hartlage claimed Star Nation for $30,000 in September 2023 at Churchill Downs.
“I was all the way down to nothing when I claimed Star Nation,” Hartlage said. “For a month, we didn’t have a horse in 2023. I’ll miss it. I feel better about it since I finally made up my mind to do it. I’ve been debating it for the last couple of years. I had my chance when we had no horses, back in ’23. I said: ‘Ah, let’s go another round.’ I couldn’t really get nobody brewed up for 2-year-olds, or at least I didn’t go for it, because I always liked to have that 2-year-old coming up.”
Hartlage was raised in Shively, Ky., a Louisville suburb minutes from Churchill Downs, where he became wildly popular after launching his training career there in 1980. Hartlage said he worked under trainer Lyle Whiting, father of 1992 Kentucky Derby-winning trainer Lynn Whiting, before striking out on his own, but his early tutoring was “mostly self-directing stuff.”
Hartlage’s first winner (Right Riot) was May 15, 1980, at Churchill Downs, according to Equibase, racing’s official data gathering organization.
The red-headed Hartlage became a fixture on the Kentucky-Arkansas circuit, with 97 percent of his 675 career victories, to date, coming in the two jurisdictions. Hartlage won 230 races at Churchill Downs and 133 at Ellis Park. He has 207 career Oaklawn victories, the first coming Feb. 20, 1982. Hartlage had at least one victory at 38 consecutive Oaklawn meetings (1982-2019). Most of his winners, Kentucky or Arkansas, were ridden by Joe Johnson.
Hartlage shared the 1989 Churchill Downs Fall Meet training title with future Hall of Famer D. Wayne Lukas and was Oaklawn’s co-leading trainer in 1997 with Kenny Smith. Hartlage and Smith each won 26 races.
Hartlage’s most successful early runners included Grade 3 winners Savings and Maskra’s Lady and Sea Trek, who captured the 1988 Rebel Stakes at Oaklawn before finishing third in the Arkansas Derby (G1) and 17th in the Kentucky Derby (G1). Sea Trek was Hartlage’s only Kentucky Derby starter. Hartlage also won 15 races with Felsenthal.
Hartlage won the G3 Rebel – an important Kentucky Derby prep – again in 1994 with club-footed Judge T C, who hadn’t started in nearly five months. Hartlage claimed Judge T C out of his June 1993 career debut at Churchill Downs for $30,000. Judge T C, in 1995, won the Fayette Stakes (G2) at Keeneland and the Clark Handicap (G3) at Churchill Downs.
Hartlage won four races in 1997 at Oaklawn with Krigeorj’s Gold, including the closing-day Fifth Season Stakes.
Hartlage trained Judge T C and Krigeorj’s Gold for major clients Robert “Country” and Bea Roberts. Hartlage declined an offer to train privately for Country Roberts and ultimately reached his greatest heights during a lengthy run with breeder/owner Anita Ebert and her late husband, Barry.
Hartlage and the Eberts won an allowance race in 2002 at Oaklawn with Ornate, who captured the Pleasant Temper Stakes later that year at Kentucky Downs. Ornate later achieved acclaim as a blue-hen mare for Anita Ebert, producing, among others, High Heels, French Kiss and On Fire Baby, all Oaklawn stakes winners for Hartlage. High Heels won the Fantasy (G2) in 2007 and also ran third in the Kentucky Oaks (G1), the country’s biggest race for 3-year-old fillies, later that year at Churchill Downs. French Kiss won the Pippin in 2009.
Hartlage said On Fire Baby, a gray daughter of sprint champion Smoke Glacken, was the best horse he trained. On Fire Baby was a five-time stakes winner, including the Apple Blossom Handicap (G1) in 2013 at Oaklawn and La Troienne (G1) in 2014 at Churchill Downs. On Fire Baby won the Apple Blossom, among the country’s biggest two-turn events for older fillies and mares, off a 10 ½-month layoff.
“Just winning is really a big deal, but probably my biggest thrill was when On Fire Baby won the Apple Blossom here,” Hartlage said. “That was my first Grade 1 and she was off 11 months, so that was super. Never going to beat that.”
Hartlage had as many as 35-40 horses in the 1990s. But his numbers, including starts and victories, have declined sharply in recent years, particularly after he and Ebert ended their business relationship in the late 2010s.
“It’s sad,” said Alex Rankin, who owns Upson Downs Farm, a breeding and layup facility on the outskirts of Louisville in Goshen, Ky. “Boy, what an institution he is and has been.”
Hartlage began training for Rankin in the 1980s. Their partnership was punctuated in 1994 by Packet, a daughter of Polish Navy filly who won maiden special weight and allowance races at Oaklawn, then three consecutive stakes at the Churchill Downs Spring Meet, including the La Troienne.
“There’s no other trainer that you’re going to have more fun winning a race with than Red Dog,” Rankin said. “You may have as much fun, but you’re never going to have more fun – believe me.”
Rankin said following Packet’s victory in the La Troienne, then listed, the party moved from the winner’s circle to a watering hole in Shively.
“We got pizza or something like that and I’ve never bought a beer in that place – never,” Rankin said. “Red Dog wasn’t buying it, it was all his entourage, friends. He walks in and he was like a rock star, now, I’m telling you.”
Rankin said he owns a piece of Harleezy, who races under the Get Up Stables banner (Hartlage, his brother, Tim, and daughter, Jennifer Vessels) after being claimed for $20,000 in September 2023 at Churchill Downs.
Gary Hartlage said he hopes to run Harleezy maybe twice more at the meeting. The 5-year-old Palace gelding represents Hartlage’s last victory (Nov. 20 at Churchill Downs) and last Oaklawn victory (Jan. 27, 2024). Harleezy has run in two allowance races this season at Oaklawn, finishing fourth Dec. 6 and seventh Feb. 23. Hartlage said the plan is for Harleezy to move to trainer Paul McGee following the gelding’s final Oaklawn start.
Asked what he will do in retirement, Gary Hartlage said, jokingly, “nothing.”
“I’ve got a home in Kentucky, in Louisville,” Hartlage said. “I’ll probably still come down here and visit during the meet. This is my second home. This is my home away from home.”
Hartlage’s 675 victories are from 4,773 starts, according to Equibase, with $15,728,176 in purse earnings.
Sam Feldpausch, Hartlage’s longtime right-hand man, said the 2024-2025 Oaklawn meeting is also his last before retirement.
Finish Lines
Reigning Horse of the Year Thorpedo Anna is the 2-5 program favorite for the $400,000 Azeri Stakes (G2) for older fillies and mares at 1 1/16 miles Saturday at Oaklawn. … Hall of Fame trainer D. Wayne Lukas recorded two victories Sunday at Oaklawn, pushing his career North American total to 4,946, according to Equibase, racing’s official data gathering organization. Lukas won the eighth race with Perfect Force ($10.60) for owner BC Stables and the ninth race with Bestfriend Rocket($8.40) for prominent Arkansas owner Frank Fletcher. Lukas is the ninth-winningest trainer in North American history, according to Equibase. He is the eighth-winningest trainer in Oaklawn history with 380 victories. … Favored Devils Fork ($7.60) won Sunday’s 10th and final race to give Arkansas owner John Ed Anthony his record-extending 298th career Oaklawn victory. Cristian Torres rode Devils Fork for trainer John Ortiz.
