Kentucky Derby 2023 gives Marr, Wild On Ice a place to be

Louisville, Ky.

Joel Marr was not supposed to be at Churchill Downs this month. Neither was Wild On Ice. Where they were expected to be was hard to say.

“He’d probably be at Lone Star in Texas,” Marr said. “He’s Texas bred. He would be eligible to run in some restricted stakes. There’s stakes races in New Mexico, too, going a route and short. We’ve got Remington in Oklahoma. There’s places to go.”

One of them, though, was not Sunland Park. That was where Wild On Ice’s story had a surprising twist last month. It was not quite Bugs Bunny’s “left toin in Albuqoique.” More of a right turn out of El Paso.

Kentucky Derby 2023: Connections plan next workouts.

In less than two minutes, Marr’s plans for Wild On Ice’s spring were detoured to the Churchill Downs backstretch. In the shadow of Todd Pletcher and Brad Cox and their more celebrated colts, the 55-year-old trainer and his 3-year-old gelding are quietly preparing among them for Kentucky Derby 2023.

“We weren’t thinking about the Kentucky Derby,” Marr said this past week on Horse Racing Nation’s Ron Flatter Racing Pod. “To be honest we were just thinking about the Sunland Derby and hoping we could improve off our previous (races).”

Improve? That seemed easy. The Tapizar gelding lost his first two races of 2023 by a combined 44 lengths. In a six-horse field for the Grade 3, $600,000 Sunland Park Derby, Wild On Ice was the longest shot on the board. Chasing a hot, early pace that completely fell apart, he picked up the pieces and paid off for the comparatively few win tickets that had him at 35-1.

With 60-year-old Ken Tohill riding, Wild On Ice went from an allowance winner with only $49,000 in lifetime earnings to being eligible for America’s biggest race.

That still meant breeder-owner Frank Sumpter, who is based in Lamesa, Texas, about halfway between Lubbock and Midland-Odessa, had to fork over a $6,000 late-nomination fee. There was not much time, either. The Sunland Park Derby was run on a Sunday afternoon. The payment deadline was the following night.

“They told me that night if you’re going to nominate, you better do it tomorrow, because at 12 midnight, it becomes $200,000,” Marr said, referring to what the fee would have been to supplement for the $3 million Kentucky Derby. “I said we’re not going for $200,000, I can promise you that.”

Once they decided to take the $6,000 leap, Marr and Sumpter realized they never had been down the Derby trail before. They did not know exactly how to make that $6,000 payment. It was like going to a restaurant and asking whether to pay at the table or at the register.

“I said just relax,” Marr said. “I’ll call them. We’ll get it done. It’s not a big deal, so we paid the $6,000. I mean we just made plenty of money to do that.”

The Sunland Park Derby victory was worth $356,400, so finding less than 2 percent of that for the Derby nomination was not a problem. Logistics, however, were. That was where Marr brought the story back to that right turn out of El Paso. That is where Sunland Park is, sort of. It is on the New Mexico side of the border with Texas.

Marr’s plan would have been to keep training at Sunland before shipping late this month to Kentucky. In fact, Wild On Ice put in a 49.44-second workout covering a half-mile back home April 7.

“We’ll train here (in New Mexico), and we’ll get a breeze in on Friday, which was the last day of training at Sunland Park,” Marr said. “We couldn’t stay any longer.”

Marr was not alone with that conundrum. He said horsemen in New Mexico were given fewer training dates across the state. It used to be when one track closed, the next one on the calendar, such as Ruidoso Downs or Albuquerque, would have been open. Now Marr said there are gaps in the training schedule that leave horses with nowhere to go in New Mexico.

“We had to make a choice, a decision at that point,” Marr said. “We have to go somewhere.”

Wild On Ice finally provided the performance that gave his connections a good place to go. It happened to provide them the option of a lifetime.

Yes, the winning time of 1:51.39 that windy March 26 afternoon was the slowest in the 18 runnings of the 1 1/8-mile Sunland Park Derby. But Wild On Ice still was faster than his five rivals, and he provided the gift of redemption for a trainer who was both patient and confident.

“I knew we hadn’t run our race yet,” Marr said. “That’s one of the reasons I went ahead and decided to run. I wasn’t sure that we were going to run in the Sunland Derby just because of the two previous races.”

Marr admitted he was more than just frustrated with Wild On Ice’s last-place effort Jan. 29 in the Riley Allison Derby and a very, very distant third Feb. 28 in the Mine That Bird Derby.

“I was mad at myself and just upset with the way things happened. That we hadn’t seen the right horse yet,” he said, recalling the days before deciding to go in the Sunland Park Derby, a virtual win-and-you’re-in qualifier for the Kentucky Derby. “Then I thought $600,000, my horse is doing great, it’s going to be six, seven horses. I’d be an idiot not to do it, and so we entered. Frank said, ‘I didn’t think you were going to enter.’ I didn’t either, but we’ve got to take a shot.”

Now Sumpter and Marr are taking another shot, and so is Tohill, who is set to become the oldest jockey on record in the Kentucky Derby. They will do so with a horse who was no shorter this weekend than 70-1 in Las Vegas futures and as long as 200-1.

Wild On Ice might have raised an eyebrow or two Monday, when he was clocked going five furlongs in 1:00.0 in his first breeze at Churchill. It was the fastest workout among the 12 at that distance that day.

Marr was quick to remind that Sunland Park produced Mine That Bird, another gelding, who scored as a 50-1 long shot in a wet run for the roses in 2009.

“You know Firing Line ran second in the (2015 Kentucky) Derby after coming from the Sunland Park Derby,” Marr said. “You never know.”

Marr is getting a second chance at a big day in May at Churchill Downs. Five years ago he brought Sunland Park Oaks winner Blamed and her five-race winning streak to the Kentucky Oaks (G1) only to scratch her because of a foot fracture.

“You just hold your breath when you become eligible for such a race,” he said. “That’s what we’re doing right now. Every morning you pray not to win. You just pray that you can be there.”

If Marr’s name looks familiar, it probably is because of Peppers Pride. He trained the mare in all 19 of her races. With Carlos Madeira riding every time, all 19 starts resulted in victories across New Mexico from 2005 to 2008. Years after becoming a cult favorite, Peppers Pride was euthanized in 2019 at age 16 after a case of laminitis.

“She was just so intelligent, almost super-human,” Marr said. “She always knew what was going on. She just had that instinct. I’m sure at times I didn’t do the best job, and Carlos probably didn’t ride the best race, but it didn’t matter. She got us there.”

Marr and Peppers Pride were inextricably linked for life. Now the 34th-year trainer hopes to top that with Wild On Ice, even if he is a 200-1 shot to win the Kentucky Derby.

“I hope we do,” he said.

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