Editor’s note: Gargan was interviewed before Thursday’s Schuylerville Stakes.
Question: What’s a general overview of your background until now?
Answer: Well, I grew up on the racetrack. My father [Dan] was a jockey. He actually rode in the Belmont against Secretariat, so it’s pretty cool that I ended up winning the Belmont. He won the [Kentucky] Oaks that year, ’73, with Bag of Tunes, so that was a pretty big accomplishment. I grew up my whole life in horse racing. I worked for Wayne [Lukas] as a young kid for quite a while. Then I worked for Tony Reinstedler for a little bit, then went to work for Nick [Zito]. Worked for Nick for quite a bit. When I left Nick, I was a jockey’s agent for about six or seven years. Took a break from that and ended up being a horse trainer.
Q: What made you want to get back into the training aspect after being a jockey’s agent?
A: I actually had Brian Hernandez, who won the [Kentucky] Derby this year, and Jesus Castanon, who’s won the Preakness. I was representing them, I think, at the same time, and I just decided I like horses. I bought a couple babies, and we came up here with Merrill Scherer, who was really like a father to me. Me and Merrill came up to Saratoga with some claimers and a couple babies. I bought one at Keeneland and it ended up winning first time out. We sold it. Then I went back and was just playing around on the farm, doing things like that and really enjoying it — I was in great shape at the time; wish I could lose that 25, 30 pounds again — and ended up doing it again next year. Me and Merrill came back to Saratoga and had another first-time starter win and didn’t get him sold. He went home, and so did the rest of them. Then we came back the next year, and [then-racing secretary] P.J. Campo asked me if I wanted to stay. So we went to Belmont, and they ran in Merrill’s name. P.J. talked me into getting my trainer’s license, and here we are today.
Q: How long since you’ve had your license?
A: It’ll be 12 years soon.
Q: You grew up in Louisville?
A: Right outside the [Churchill Downs] stable gate.
Q: When P.J. asked, it’s New York, and the quality is obviously good, but I know Kentucky roots run strong. Did you have any reservations?
A: Well, I had a couple of really nice horses. We were claiming a lot back then. We didn’t have that many babies, only one or two that I’d buy for myself. Basically, I’d own a piece of every horse in the barn, and we were having fun and hanging out. Things just snowballed. We claimed some nice horses like Divine Miss Grey, Tax; owned a part of both of those and went on with several other stakes winners we claimed. Midwest Thoroughbreds ended up being a big part of my stable for a long time and [owner] Morris Bailey ended up being a big part of my stable. Great guys, and I was lucky enough they helped me spring forward to where I’m at where I got lucky and started training for Dean Reeves and Randy Hill, who are a big part of my stable now. They switched me from claiming to buying babies, and that’s kind of how we ended up to having Dornoch and Society Man and Dakota Gold and a lot of other stakes horses we have right now.
Q: How many horses do you have?
A: We only have 40. We keep 30 here and 10 at Belmont.
Q: Did you say to your other owners that you’d like to start buying more babies?
A: Well, it’s just in general, to get to the next level, you have to find a way to get stakes horses. The claiming game, it’s lucrative and it’s fun — don’t get me wrong, we had a great time with it. We still claim a horse here and there. Everybody at one stage claimed horses. Chad Brown claimed horses, Bill Mott used to be a claiming trainer. Chad, the first year he was a trainer, he claimed a lot of horses. That’s just where you start. The ultimate goal was to have these kinds of horses, to have Dornochs. You’re not going to claim those. And we’re fortunate enough that we had owners step in and start doing this. Now we’ve got partnerships, got a good group of guys — the Gladwells helped me at sales, and Megan Jones, Scott Everett. We’ve got a few other people that are really going to step up. I think we’re going to have a lot of success in the next couple of years. We already have a good 2-year-old this year. We have Complexion running in the Schuylerville, so that’s exciting. We’ve run two 2-year-olds and we had a winner. We normally don’t run that early, but she’s really precocious and we’re really excited about her. There’s a few others who will be fun later on.
Q: When you start buying more babies, does it make you more patient?
A: I’m kind of a patient trainer anyway, even when I claimed horses. That’s the one thing, if anybody’s frustrated, I’m not the guy who’s going to run everybody all the time. I’m a really patient trainer, and I think that’s my strong suit. We’re patient, we try to do the right thing. We need every horse to last, we need every horse to make the races, so we’ll stop on horses and bring them back later. Society Man ran up here as a 2-year-old at Saratoga. I sent him home and stopped on him and brought him back, and he made it to the [Kentucky] Derby and won the Matt Winn the last time out. It’s different ways to get there. Certain horses can do different ways, but sometimes you have to take a deep breath and stop and come back later.
Q: What’s your life been like since Dornoch’s win in the Belmont Stakes?
A: Nothing’s changed. Not really, no. We’re still out here working seven days a week. My help’s really good. I’m blessed to have such a good crew. Really good riders and everybody here. We’re here, we’re happy and we’re just looking for the next one. It’s a great ride, we want to enjoy [Dornoch], but we’ve got 14 2-year-olds here, and hopefully we can develop one of them into being a Grade I winner.