Saxer Has a Nose for Winners

Imagine an airline pilot who is afraid of heights. Or a sailor who gets seasick.

Phil Saxer, who trains Arabian horses, knows all too well what that must be like.

Saxer has chronic allergies triggered by horse hair, making it difficult for him to breath. He takes medication twice a day and for a while was a regular at emergency rooms around Los Alamitos Race Course, visiting them when he couldn’t get enough air.

But those troubles haven’t stopped Saxer, 44, from succeeding in the profession he fell in love with as a 15-year-old boy selling the Racing Form at now-defunct Liberty Bell Park Race Course in Philadelphia.

This season, his stable of about three dozen Arabians has produced 36 victories at Los Alamitos. That total is fairly sizable considering that most nights no more than three Arabian races at six furlongs are on the card.

Saxer had been extremely hot. Five of the six horses he sent out to trials of the Drinkers of the Wind Futurity qualified for last Saturday’s final. Although none won that race, including the favorite Seyvilla Proof, Saxer won with Tigger, a 4-year-old colt that captured the $21,250 California Derby.

If the disappointing performance of Seyvilla Proof, who broke outward from post nine and never recovered, wasn’t bad enough, Saxer also has had his share of breathing problems after the Santa Ana winds kicked up again last week. The other day, Saxer was apologetic as he sneezed and wheezed through an interview.

“I’ve always had allergies since I was a kid,” he said. “But I do this because I love it.”

Saxer began working at Liberty Bell Park in 1969 and after graduating from high school three years later, went to work as a groom at several East Coast thoroughbred racetracks. It was during his 10 years in the barns, rubbing down horses daily, that he began to notice he had a big problem.

“I was young and, you know how that is, I liked what I was doing,” he said. “So I kept going.”

By the time he was in his late 20s, though, it became obvious he had to get out of the barns.

“I wasn’t getting used to being near horses,” he said. “I was getting worse.” In 1983, he earned his thoroughbred training certificate in New York and saddled horses up and down the Eastern seaboard. Then in 1990, reeling from several financial setbacks, he accepted a contract from a Florida-based conglomerate to train about 40 Arabian horses, a breed he knew little about, but took to right away. One of his first mounts, Monarch AH, won 19 of its first 23 races.

After a couple of years of bouncing from coast to coast, Saxer settled at Los Alamitos, opening a barn in 1993. Most of the owners for whom he trains horses are based on the East Coast.

Saxer’s longtime assistant and girlfriend, Maureen Stillwell, said Saxer has better managed his allergies by avoiding day-to-day physical contact with the horses.

“It’s not so bad anymore,” Stillwell said. “He just has to take his medicine. It can get like bronchitis, where his chest fills up and it’s hard to breath. He has to stay out of the dust.”

Saxer’s 10 full-time employees and two part-time workers do the dirty work now.

“I’m not in the stalls as much rubbing down horses, stirring up dander or shaking out straw,” he said. “I wanted to learn how to do this business right, to see what makes it tick, and the only way to do that was to spend time in the stalls and get to know horses. That’s why I was grooming for so long.”

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Longtime trainer Charlie Bloomquist joined an elite club when he saddled the 900th winner of his career, Awesome Ashley, in the ninth race Oct. 18 at Los Alamitos. Blane Schvaneveldt, John Cooper and Caesar Dominguez are the only other quarter horse trainers in track history with 900 or more victories.

True to form, Bloomquist kidded about the milestone.

“I sure wish it had been my 1,000th win,” he said.

Bloomquist, 59, has been a trainer for 30 years, most of them at Los Alamitos. He has 17 victories this season, earning $150,000.

“It’s a little different now than it was when I started,” he said. “We didn’t have as many races back then. Today, I try not to have so many horses in my barn, but I try to get a little better [quality] horses.”

Bloomquist has no retirement plans.

“I don’t know what else I would do,” he said. “You have to have a job before you retire, so I can’t retire yet.”

Los Alamitos notes

The grand finale of Arabian horse racing takes place Nov. 21 at Los Alamitos with a series of races, including the $100,000 Arabian Cup Championship. The Arabian Jockey Club has several social events planned leading up to the event. For information call (303) 450-4714 or send e-mail to https://www.ajc@arabianracing.org. . . . With a victory in the Las Damas Handicap Oct. 17, Corona Cash, a former stablemate of Dashing Folly, became only the 12th quarter horse to earn $1.2 million. It was the 11th victory in 17 career starts for the Donna McArthur-trained filly. . . . Jockey Daron Long won her 100th career Arabian race last Thursday, piloting Baskwick, a 45 to 1 longshot, to victory in the seventh race. . .Jockey Alex Bautista (164 wins) leads the track in victories aboard all breeds. . . . Eddie Garcia, the top quarter horse jockey at Los Alamitos four of the last five years, has 148 quarter horse victories, tops at the track. He said his goal of a record 200 victories is still in sight, despite missing three weeks last month with a shoulder injury.