Ever since trainer Chad Brown and owner Sol Kumin joined forces in 2014, they have reached the heights of success in Thoroughbred racing both separately and as a coupled entry.
In the past nine years, Brown has been honored with four Eclipse Awards as the sport's outstanding trainer, won the Preakness Stakes (G1) twice, and stands sixth on the all-time earnings list among trainers with roughly $254 million.
Kumin, working with several trainers, has owned shares of horses who have won more than 85 grade 1 stakes and his stable of runners has included Triple Crown champion Justify and Kentucky Derby (G1) and Breeders' Cup Classic (G1) winner and Horse of the Year Authentic , both of whom were trained by Bob Baffert.
Together Brown and Kumin have won a score of graded stakes and a trio of Breeders' Cup stakes, but they have yet to share the euphoria of winning a Triple Crown race together.
That could change when the first Saturday in May rolls around, though not in the manner they, or anyone else for that matter, would have figured.
There in the past performances of the Kentucky Derby probables you'll see a joint listing for Brown and Kumin's Head of Plains Partners stable, but not as an owner and trainer.
Rather, two preeminent figures among trainers and owners are the proud breeders of Santa Anita Derby (G1) winner Practical Move, a son of Practical Joke who ranks as one of the favorites in the May 6 opening leg of the Triple Crown at Churchill Downs.
"This is super exciting and I'm very happy about it," Kumin said. "It's crazy how it's all coming together."
Crazy indeed. For as much as Kumin and Brown head large, prosperous, and highly visible stables, as breeders they are practically invisible. They teamed to breed just one mare, a daughter of Afleet Alex named Ack Naughty who raced for Kumin and was trained by Brown. Her second foal was a jackpot. In the West Coast-based Practical Move, trainer Tim Yakteen and the owners who purchased him at a 2-year-old sale a year ago have a bay colt who has never finished worse than third in seven career starts and enters the Kentucky Derby with three straight wins, all in graded stakes company.
"Can you imagine if he wins the Kentucky Derby?" Kumin said about the colt he and Brown sold for $230,000 at last year's OBS Spring Sale to his current owners, Leslie Amestoy, Pierre Jean Amestoy Jr., and Roger Beasley. "What were the odds of that happening?"
Astronomical is the correct answer.
While the sport's biggest farms breed dozens of horses a year, there is usually only a handful of them represented with a starter in the Run for the Roses.
In fact, the odds against Brown and Kumin breeding a grade 1 winner were so high that the experience has caught them by surprise.
Brown says breeding was a one-time venture and he prefers to be known for his laurels as a trainer.
"It was a fun exercise with Sol and I don't want to give off the impression I'm interested in doing anything other than training horses," Brown said.
Kumin says he'd be much happier if he was the owner-breeder of Practical Move instead of just the breeder.
"It's a different experience because our premier enjoyment is racing," said Kumin who runs Head of Plains for his three partners, Steve Cohen, owner of the New York Mets, Jim Pallotta, and Jim Caray. Kumin and his partners also race under the Madaket Stables banner. "Chad and I wish we owned the colt, and for me, I wish we still owned the mare. That's the part that I'm struggling with a bit. I'm OK with selling her babies, but I should have kept the mare."
Yes, Kumin and Brown no longer own Ack Naughty. The 11-year-old New York-bred mare was sold through the ELiTE consignment to Chester and Mary Broman for $500,000 at the recent Keeneland January Horses of All Ages Sale, a month after Practical Move's initial stakes win in the Los Alamitos Futurity (G2). She was carrying an Upstart foal at the time, which she later lost.
The sale was just another unexpected turn of events in a tale filled with surprises and unlikely circumstances.
Kumin says Ack Naughty was among the first 10 horses he bought when she started racing for Kumin's Sheep Pond Partners group in 2014. The daughter of the General Meeting mare Dash for Money was a productive, stakes-placed runner for Brown and her full ownership team that also included Nantucket Thoroughbred Partners. She placed in 12 of 15 starts and earned $310,450.
When her career came to an end in 2017, Kumin deviated from his typical path of selling his retired mares. He decided to buy out the other ownership group and add Ack Naughty to his small band of broodmares.
"We raced her for a few years and she won a few good races for us. She was a cool horse who grew into a really beautiful filly. We always liked her and we felt when it was time to sell her she was worth more to us than we would have gotten from a sale," Kumin said. "Sometimes you get attached to them and if it's not a crazy financial move, you'll keep them."
This time, Kumin asked Brown to partner with him in breeding Ack Naughty and with a nod of the head the well-known owner-trainer combo were now breeders.
"I asked Chad if he wanted to split buying her and he said 'Sure,'" Kumin said. "We said we would alternate using the stallion seasons we had accrued to breed to her so it wouldn't cost us anything for that."
In her first mating season, Ack Naughty was bred to Violence and in 2019 dropped a colt who never raced.
The second foal was a son of Practical Joke, a grade 1 winner of $1.7 million trained by Brown. He was ultimately named Practical Move.
The bay colt failed to sell for $90,000 at the 2021 Keeneland September Yearling Sale, but was sold through the Eisaman Equine consignment to his current owners for $230,000 at the OBS Spring Sale of 2-Year-Olds in Training.
Sent to trainer Tim Yakteen in California, Practical Move showed the kind of promise that prompted him to run the then-2-year-old in the Bob Hope Stakes (G3), his fourth career start after breaking his maiden in his third via disqualification of first-place finisher Fort Bragg. One start later, the Los Al Futurity accounted for his second win, the first in which he crossed the wire in the lead.
Keeping tabs of the colt he bred was easy for Kumin. Each time Practical Move ran, with the exception of his debut, Kumin was a part-owner of another starter in the race. Some of them were also trained by Yakteen.
In the Kentucky Derby, Kumin will follow that same script, having two of his horses, Two Phil's and Reincarnate, to root for, and Practical Move as backup insurance.
"It seems like every time he runs we have a horse in there, so it's been a little different experience watching him run," Kumin said. "We even have two in the Derby running against him. It will be nice to watch him when we are not running against him so I can cheer for him."
For Kumin, becoming the breeder of a grade 1 winner is the latest in a limited yet fruitful foray into the side of the game that produces the athletes.
In the last few years, he enjoyed success with progeny of one of his old runners, the stallion Slumber , owning the homebred graded stakes winners Fluffy Socks and Sy Dog sired by him.
When Calumet's interest in Slumber waned, Kumin bought him for a nominal fee and moved him Rockridge Stud in New York. To support his stallion, he expanded his broodmare band from five to 25, keeping them at Rockridge and Dell Ridge Farm. To date, Slumber has accounted for 15 different starters in three crops of racing age with nine winners (60%) and is billed as one of only two New York stallions with a graded stakes winner in 2021 and 2022.
"Slumber has given us a lot of fun as a stallion," Kumin said. "He's done really great for having such a small group of mares."
While Slumber is the hub of Kumin's breeding program, he and Brown still have a piece of Ack Naughty's legacy.
Her most recent foal is a Complexity yearling colt, who will likely be sold this summer at the Keeneland sale. Of course, depending on what happens in the next few months, that could change.
"We have one more baby on the ground," Kumin said. "We're planning to sell him, but perhaps before that Chad might like him, and we'll keep him and race him."
Until then, Kumin and Brown will watch the Kentucky Derby from a completely different vantage point; one that will generate a much different feeling than what they usually experience as owner and trainer.
"If we become the breeders of a Kentucky Derby winner," Kumin said, "I think Chad and I are just going to laugh and go have a drink."
