And They’re Off : Ron McAttee Isn’t Sentimental About Racehorses. They’re an Investment. On This Day, His Bay Gelding Brought Home the Paycheck

Ron McAtee looks like a horseman. Tall and rangy, wearing Western-style jeans and hand-tooled cowboy boots, McAtee is an eye-catching figure in a box overlooking the homestretch at Santa Anita Park--a kind of citified Marlboro man.

In fact, he talks knowledgeably about horseflesh with the other racehorse owners in adjoining boxes. “You just look for a moneymaker,” he says, explaining his own investment policy. “I don’t care if it’s an 8-year-old, a 4-year-old or a 3-year-old, as long as it brings in that paycheck.”

But McAtee, who co-owns three thoroughbreds with his wife, Melodie, doesn’t get any closer to his horses than to give them a proprietary pat or two on the neck as his trainer straps on the saddle in the paddock.

“I can barely hang onto a horse,” says McAtee, 49, a San Diego caterer who was born and reared in Los Angeles.

There are more than 10,000 licensed owners in the state, according to racing authorities. They’re a varied group, from entrepreneurs with enough horses to fill the average Holiday Inn to owners of a single oat-devouring nag, claimed for the price of a used car.

By most accounts, the average owner is like McAtee--a modest investor who got into racehorses for dreams of glory in addition to anticipated tax breaks.

According to the Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Assn. in Lexington, Ky., owning a racehorse can cost between $20,000 and $32,000 a year--including trainer’s fee, feed and bedding, stable rents, veterinarian’s services, and blacksmith’s fees.

“By the time you add it all up, you might be spending $25,000, with no guarantee of winning anything,” says Pat Trotter, the association’s director of marketing and publicity.

Why do they get into it?

“Stupidity,” snaps Phil Hersh, a retired plumber from Los Angeles and one of McAtee’s box-seat buddies. “It’s an expensive tax break.”

“I was hoping somebody could tell me,” adds Joe Shields, who has a horse entered in the fourth race.

But for the small crowd of owners around trainer David Bernstein, this is mostly a pleasurable social scene. On racing days, they spend the afternoon schmoozing about horses, good-naturedly berating each other’s handicapping abilities, rooting for each other’s horses and complaining about the burdens of ownership.

These are resolutely informal people, preferring the relaxed atmosphere of the box seats to the rigid dress code of the Turf Club, where the aristocrats of the racing scene and their guests watch the races in ties and jackets.

“Those are people who want to have lunch, maybe a little bit of glamour,” says McAtee, looking toward the fenced-off Turf Club area at the east end of the track. “A lot of them have no real interest in horses.” He surveys his friends, all of them without ties. “We’ve got some class here too,” he says.

Bernstein’s clients are sweet on racing the way some people are sweet on ice cream. Hersh hears the track bugler play the call to the post and he becomes animated. “They’re playing my song,” he deadpans, much the way Bob Hope did when he originated the line in “The Lemon Drop Kid.”

“Racing gets into your blood,” says McAtee, who has been to all of the big race tracks in the country. He never misses a day at Del Mar in August.

“When they play the track anthem there, ‘Where the Turf Meets the Surf,’ I stand there with my hand on my heart,” he says.

Today, his friends are buzzing about McAtee’s horse Wood Spirit, the favorite in the second race at Santa Anita. It’s the first time the horse will race since McAtee claimed him last month for $25,000.

“He looks like the speed of the field,” says Bernstein, a beefy, worried-looking man, who has been training horses for 25 years.

Among Bernstein’s clients, McAtee is known to have some skill at spotting the quality that trainers and breeders pray for in a racehorse: the fire that rockets a horse out of the pack toward the finish line.

“I don’t think anybody’s as lucky as Ron McAtee,” says Bernstein’s assistant, Liz Philippian.

McAtee still talks about the day seven years ago, when he had horses entered in races at Hollywood Park in Los Angeles and Bay Meadows in San Mateo.

“I held down the fort with Pirata at Hollywood Park and Dave went north with Figalian,” McAtee says. “Right before the ninth race, Dave walks in with this little silver cup. We had won up there, then we won the ninth down at Hollywood Park. That’s the most fun I ever had.”

Bernstein, followed by his entourage of owners, marches down to the paddock, where Wood Spirit is being led slowly around a dirt track by a walker. The horse is led into a stall, and the men gather around to watch Bernstein strap a saddle on.

“This is where you start getting nervous,” says McAtee, eyeing the horse, a high-strung bay gelding.

“Well, I put down $2 to show on him,” says Hersh. “That’s a big bet for me.”

“You don’t often get so loosey-goosey,” says McAtee.

The horse is led out to a grassy area, where jockey Patrick Valenzuela huddles briefly with Bernstein. Then Valenzuela, lean and cocky in lemon-colored silks, jumps onto Wood Spirit’s back.

Back in the box, McAtee quietly sips a beer, waiting for the race to begin. It’s an exciting race, with Wood Spirit near the front most of the way. “Do it, do it!” shouts McAtee. His horse does it, crossing the finish line ahead of the pack, although a horse named Bolger’s Rex sticks close through the stretch.

McAtee is exuberant. “Let’s take a walk,” he says, and the friends all parade to the winner’s circle.

There’s a 20-second ceremony there, with McAtee and friends posing for a photograph beside winning horse and jockey.

Then the track announcer breaks in, announcing over the public address system: “Please hold all tickets. There is an inquiry.” The jockey on the second-place finisher has complained that he was bumped by Wood Spirit.

McAtee’s smile disappears. “You never win till they say it’s official,” he says.

He paces restlessly around the winner’s circle, then he and Bernstein head up the stairs to their seats. After an agonizing minute or two comes the announcement that the stewards will not change the order of finish. Owner and trainer stop on the stairs and slap a high five with each other.

“Sometimes you have to win a race twice,” says Bernstein, visibly relieved.

In his box seat, McAtee is all smiles again. This is what hooks you on racing, he says. “It’s an unbelievable rush,” he says. “When your horse is coming across that finish line, I don’t care if it’s a $5,000 claimer or a stakes horse, it’s like hitting a home run in the World Series.”