4/10/26 Barn Notes
by Robert Yates
Trainer Jade Cunningham said her goal this season at Oaklawn was three victories. She aimed too low.
Cunningham recorded her fifth victory of the 2025-2026 meeting in Saturday’s fifth race when Calycanthus ($18.80) captured a $30,000 claimer for older horses under David Cabrera.
Cunningham has won her five races with only 20 starters. She also has three seconds and two thirds and has approximately 10 horses currently in training.
“I can’t complain,” Cunningham said. “This is the best stats I’ve ever had.”
Cunningham, 29, was an exercise rider for the late Hall of Fame trainer D. Wayne Lukas at the 2020-2021 Oaklawn meeting before eventually rising to an assistant under trainer Dallas Stewart and striking out on her own in the summer of 2023. She has 18 career victories, including seven in 2024 and 2025.
“I have really good owners,” said Cunningham, who makes Oaklawn her winter base. “A lot of them have been very patient, which has made a huge difference in my horses. I really have a good crew this year that’s working really hard and taking good care of the horses.”
Cunningham recorded her first career victory March 9, 2024, at Oaklawn with Spankster. The victory had added significance for Cunningham because the horse had previously been trained by Lukas and his one-time assistant, Stewart. Lukas, one of the most iconic names in Thoroughbred history, died June 28. He was 89.
Cunningham said she considered Lukas a mentor and honors his memory with several keepsakes in her Oaklawn office, including a “WL” barn sign from Churchill Downs and a copy of his poem, “Out of Time.”
“Wayne was successful, but he also cared about people,” Cunningham said. “I think a lot of us sacrifice the caring about people and taking the time. Wayne was able to grow his business and be more than successful in his business, but he brought people with him.”
A two-time Oaklawn training champion, Lukas will be posthumously inducted into the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame Friday night at the Oaklawn Event Center. Oaklawn will honor Lukas with several events Saturday.
“Dawn at Oaklawn” will have a “Remembering the Coach” edition, with commentary/funny stories on Lukas from various guests. Hosted by Nancy Holthus, Dawn at Oaklawn runs 8:30 a.m.-9 a.m. (Central) on the south grandstand apron.
A memorial service for Lukas will be held in the Oaklawn chapel from 9:45 a.m.-10:30 a.m. Lukas’ family is scheduled to attend both events, which are free and open to the public.
Lukas’ family will make the trophy presentation following Saturday’s first race, “Remembering the Coach.”
Nicknamed “The Coach” (he was a high school basketball coach during the 1960s in his native Wisconsin), Lukas was honored four times as North America’s outstanding trainer (1985, 1986, 1987 and 1994) and inducted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in 1999.
Lukas was Oaklawn’s leading trainer in 1987 and 2011. He’s the ninth-winningest trainer in Oaklawn history with 384 victories, the last coming approximately two months before his death.
“There will never be another D. Wayne Lukas,” Cunningham said.
$5 Million Man
Jockey Cristian Torres became the first jockey at the 2025-2026 Oaklawn meeting to reach $5 million purse earnings when he recorded a riding triple on Thursday’s eight-race card.
Torres won the first race aboard favored Chaching Chaching ($3.60) for trainer Norm Casse, third race aboard Come Out Fighting ($12.40) for trainer Sean Williams and the sixth race aboard favored Palmer Beach ($5.40) for Williams. The triple pushed Torres’ purse earnings at the meet to $5,009,689. Thursday was Day 48 of the meeting.
“Honestly, I don’t pay attention to that,” said Torres, a two-time Oaklawn riding champion. “I just go out there and do my job. Any achievements that come, I’m happy. My job is to go out there and do the best job I can.”
Torres joined retired Hall of Famer Pat Day as the only jockeys in Oaklawn history to reach 100 victories in a single season when he won 100 races in 2022-2023. Torres set a single-season Oaklawn record for purse earnings in 2022-2023 ($6,163,941) and broke it in 2023-2024 ($6,181,368) when he repeated as leading rider with 82 victories.
Torres entered Friday with 52 victories at the meeting. Ramon Vazquez topped the standings with 55 victories. Vazquez is seeking his first career Oaklawn riding title.
Torres is scheduled to miss at least two upcoming days at the meeting (May 1 and May 2) because he will be at Churchill Downs to ride Oaklawn stakes winners Search Party (Kentucky Oaks) and Silent Tactic (Kentucky Derby). Oaklawn’s meeting ends May 2.
Torres and Vazquez are both represented by agent Cody Autrey.
Calling the Horses
The head football coach at Arkansas often presents the winning trophy for Oaklawn’s Razorback Handicap. Next season at Oaklawn, Sam Pittman could be accepting a winning trophy.
Pittman, who coached the Razorbacks in 2020-2025, owns two unraced 2-year-olds with trainer Kenny McPeek and Lance Gasaway, who teamed to win the 2024 Kentucky Derby with Mystik Dan.
Gasaway said he and McPeek are partners with Pittman in Seventeen Dreams, a Goldencents colt, and Arkansas Dreams, an Epicenter filly. McPeek, as an agent, purchased the horses for $60,000 and $75,000, respectively, at Fasig-Tipton’s 2025 Kentucky Fall Yearling Sale. Gasaway said he met Pittman through Daniel “Banks” Hamby and his brother Scott, Hot Springs natives who were also among Mystik Dan’s co-owners. Pittman has a home on Lake Hamilton, only a few miles from Oaklawn.
“He was at the Kentucky Derby, Coach Pittman was,” Gasaway said. “He came with (Scott) and that’s really how we first met.”
Gasaway said he and Pittman quickly bonded because both played football during the early 1980s at NAIA programs. Pittman was a standout defensive lineman for the tradition-rich Pittsburg (Kan.) State Gorillas. Gasaway was a star wide receiver for the Arkansas-Monticello Boll Weevils.
“Just got to know him and we’d go over to his house for the Fourth of July,” Gasaway said. “He has a swimming party and got over there and just got to talk with him and we had more in common than we thought. He was at a (NAIA) school, Pittsburg State, at about the same time I was at UAM. They won national championships, just that kind of stuff. He said, ‘Were you going to root for the Hogs?’ I said, ‘Hell no, I’m a Boll Weevil.’”
Gasaway said Seventeen Dreams is named for the number of coaching jobs Pittman has had during his career. Goldencents is also the sire of Mystik Dan. Arkansas Dreams is from the first crop of champion Epicenter. Both 2-year-olds are Kentucky-breds.
“I bought them and then Pittman, he had told me he wanted to own some horses with me,” Gasaway said.
