Bradley grew up watching Clarence Picou and Robert Connelly train Thoroughbreds for his dad, former Kentucky state senator Fred Bradley. The family bought a farm in Frankfort in 1960, and when he was 10 years old Buff Bradley began galloping, breaking, and training horses. Working with horses during the day and attending classes at night, he graduated from Kentucky State University in 1989 with a degree in business management. He spent a year working in his dad’s reelection campaign and then went to work for Picou, overseeing strings at Oaklawn, Louisiana Downs, and Remington Park.

In 1993 Bradley returned to Kentucky and went out on his own. His first client, John Franks, won the 1994 Eclipse Award for Owner of the Year. Bradley scouts the sales on behalf of his clients and has advised such purchases as the stakes-placed Big Deal, who sold for $8,000 and earned nearly $100,000, and multiple stakes-placed Private Ambition, who returned more than $140,000 as an $18,000 purchase. Bradley maintains a crew at the family farm, Indian Ridge, where he runs a breeding operation, personally attends every foaling, and raises the youngsters.

Seven of Bradley’s 12 career stakes wins have come at Turfway: Gowell (2001); Valdale (2002); My Charmer (2002); Rushaway (2004); Prairie Bayou (2005); Wintergreen (2006); and Likely Exchange (2007).

Bradley's Prairie Bayou win was the comeback victory of his stable star, Brass Hat, now on extended hiatus. Brass Hat first served notice by breaking his maiden at 38-1 in the 2004 Rushaway Stakes at Turfway. He added two Grade II victories that year, Bradley's first graded wins, but in October suffered a condylar fracture in the 2004 Lone Star Derby. The Prairie Bayou was Brass Hat's second start back after a 14-month recovery. He began 2006 with wins in the Grade II New Orleans Handicap and the Grade I Donn Handicap.

Bradley and his wife, Kim, have three children, daughters Kory and Jett and son Drew. The family lives at Indian Ridge Farm in Frankfort.

Joe Cain's first interest in racing had nothing to do with horses. "When we were kids, my brother and I raced the farm mules through the fields on the farm where I grew up," he said. His love of competition stirred again when he had a chance to work with Thoroughbreds owned by his father-in-law. He began training full-time in 1988, working with trainer Larry Holt and then opening his own operation in Russell Springs, Kentucky, with a couple of his own claims.

Cain's first win came so long ago he can't remember it, but several trainees stand out: Old Snively, Cain's first stakes winner (1999 Hoover Stakes, River Downs); Marciann, 2000 Indiana Horse of the Year; Pricearose, graded stakes-placed on grass in 2000; Saratoga Humor, winner of the 2003 New Year's Eve Stakes at Mountaineer and the 2004 Wishing Well at Turfway; and Slim Justice, winner of the 2004 Hoosier Silver Cup at Hoosier Park.

Topping the list of Cain's successes is Private Horde, a talented sprinter he broke and trained for owner Billy Tucker. Private Horde posted a 13-10-4 record and earnings of $728,643 in 47 starts before retiring in early 2006. Among his wins are seven stakes, including Cain's only graded stakes win, the 2003 Alfred G. Vanderbilt (G2). Private Horde also gave Cain his only Breeders' Cup entry to date, racing in the 2003 Sprint. At Turfway Private Horde won two runnings of both the Forego Stakes (2003, 2005) and Marfa Stakes (2003, 2004).

Though mid-July 2008 Cain had posted 16 career stakes wins, including seven at Turfway, most recently the 2007 Weekend Delight with Exciting Justice. He was Turfway's leading trainer for the 2005 Holiday Meet and is regularly among the leaders at Indiana Downs and Hoosier Park.

The son of Kentucky horseman Vernon Coyle, Doug Coyle has been around racehorses since birth. His earliest memories center on the family farm near Keeneland, where from the age of about 8 he helped care for the family's broodmares, foals, and yearlings. The elder Coyle kept horses in training at the farm, at Keeneland, and at the Training Center, and if he weren't in school, Doug was handling horses. The day after his high school graduation in 1978, he went to work for his dad at the track. Over the course of a couple of years, Vernon Coyle gradually turned the training operation over to his son.

Coyle is based year round at Turfway and races in Kentucky, Indiana, and Ohio, generally at the claiming and allowance levels. Of the dozen or so horses he keeps in training, about 80 percent belong to clients. During the 2008 Winter/Spring Meet, the small stable won with 24 percent of its runners and turned in a 59 percent in-the-money performance.

The key to horses, Coyle said, is "keeping them happy, and not overtraining or overmatching them. They get frustrated and discouraged if they're in over their heads. The biggest thing is keeping them happy."

A testament to Coyle's approach is the homebred gelding Embankment. A sprinter, Embankment posted a 13-11-8 record in 74 starts over eight years. He won races every year he ran, and at the age of 11 posted four wins and three seconds from 11 starts. The gelding, now 18 years old, was retired in 2001 and still lives on the family farm. His dam, Rita Maria, also a Coyle homebred, was a two-time stakes wins at Latonia.

David England entered racing as an owner in 1995, 10 years after founding England's Turf Pro Services, a Northern Kentucky lawn and landscaping company. Always hands-on, England helped select horses for purchase and was at the barn every day. In 1998 he was Kentucky Thoroughbred Media co-Owner of the Year with 49 wins in Kentucky.

England sold his business in 2000, intending to travel while keeping a few horses in training. Instead, racing drew him back. His involvement as an owner gave him confidence to try training, and he took out his license that same year. Also driving his decision was a love for horses that began during Saturday trips to Latonia with his dad. That interest grew when at age 12 he got his first yearling, a Quarter Horse he owned until it died at 38.

Having been an owner gives England a unique perspective on training. He encourages clients' participation, works to understand what each one wants from racing, and then prepares individualized business plans to reach those goals. He limits his stable to about 20 horses, allowing him to know each horse inside and out. Based year-round at Turfway, England races primarily in Kentucky and surrounding states. His wife, former jockey and trainer Mary Adkins, is one of his exercise riders and shares in the daily responsibilities of England Racing Stables.

Rodney Faulkner grew up working for his father, long-time trainer Joe Faulkner, and was riding match races in the Texas hill country by the time he was 12 years old. He eventually outgrew riding but continued working for his dad, shipping to Texas tracks and the fair circuit from the family farm in Big Spring. Rodney took out his own trainer's license at age 18. Many of his early wins came on the Texas fair circuit.

In the late 1990s, Rodney stepped away from racing and for about three years drove a truck and worked at a refinery. Around 2000, his dad stabled a string at Thistledown and in 2001 the family sold the farm in Texas and moved permanently to Ohio. Rodney returned to training, opening a stable at Thistledown with five horses; today he has 70. He runs primarily in Kentucky, Ohio, and West Virginia and maintains strings at Thistledown and Mountaineer.

Rodney's wife, Peggy, runs the family farm in northeastern Ohio.

Bernard Flint's name appears again and again in the Turfway Park record books. He was leading trainer of the year from 1998 through 2003 and holds a record 20 individual meet titles, including a nine-meet streak from 2001 through 2003. He also holds the record for most wins in a meet with 44, set in the 2003 Winter/Spring Meet. Through 2006 he has 31 stakes wins at Turfway, second only to D. Wayne Lukas’s 35. His most recent addition to that total is the 2006 Kentucky Cup Juvenile Fillies with Cohiba Miss.

Flint trained and showed Quarter Horses as a youngster and for several years trained Thoroughbreds part-time at the Fair Grounds while working as a detective with the New Orleans Police Department. He began training full-time in 1976. Over the course of his career, he has won 213 blacktype races including 18 graded events and has been the leading trainer at nine different tracks: Churchill Downs, Keeneland, Oaklawn Park, Hoosier Park, Ellis Park, Turfway, Canterbury, Sportsman’s Park, and Balmoral. Flint saddled his first Grade 1 winner in 2001, Outofthebox in the Super Derby at Louisiana Downs. Among Flint’s recent stars is Runway Model, who finished third in the 2004 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies (G1) after wins in the Golden Rod (G2) and Darley Alcibiades (G2).

Flint lives with his wife, Terri, in Louisville, Kentucky, and has three sons, Steven, also a trainer, Scott, and Lance.

The son of longtime Kentucky horseman Dravo Foley, Greg Foley never wanted to do anything but train horses. He attended Western Kentucky University at his parents' urging but left after a year to work full-time with his dad and then ventured out on his own in 1981. His older sister, Vickie, also is a trainer.

Consistently among Turfway's leading trainers, Foley has captured five individual meet training titles at the track and twice, in 2005 and 2006, led all trainers in number of wins across the year's three meets. He earned his 1,000th career win at Turfway when Cherokee Nation stormed home a wire-to-wire, nine-length winner on January 23, 2008.

Through mid-July 2008 Foley has 62 career stakes, including 15 at Turfway and four from the track's days as Latonia. He has been especially successful in Turfway's two series for 3-year-olds. In 2003 and 2004 he swept the Turfway Prevue, WEBN, and John Battaglia Memorial stakes with Champali and Silver Minister, respectively. He won the Turfway Prevue again in 2006 with Final Copy and 2007 with Carnack's Choice. The filly Valentine Fever took the 2008 Cincinnati Trophy and Valdale.

In 2004 Champali gave Foley his only Breeders' Cup entry to date, finishing seventh in the Sprint but barely four lengths behind the winner. The Glitterman colt also gave Foley four of his six career graded stakes to date including his first, the 2002 Iroquois (G3). Other Foley standouts include Golden Marlin, winner of the 2003 Dogwood (G3), Pleasant Hill, winner of the 2008 Gardenia (G3), and Ellen's Lucky Star, who rang up seven stakes wins from 2003 through 2005.

As a youngster, Kim Hammond competed in barrel racing and pole bending events. At 14 she went to work for her father, Fairmount Park trainer Everett Hammond. She and her brother, four years younger, galloped horses on the family farm, and she often ponied her dad’s runners at night. After high school graduation she began taking his horses on the road.

When a heart attack forced her dad to cut back in the early 1980s, he turned most of his 100 horses over to his son. "There were hardly any women in the business then, and my dad didn't think I had a shot," Hammond said. "He gave me 12 or 15 horses." When her brother lost his string over the following 18 months, Hammond picked up some of his clients and added more of her own. She maintains about 60 horses in training.

Among Hammond's more than 1,800 career wins are four stakes victories, all at Fairmount. She has consistently been among Turfway's leading trainers by wins in the track's Winter/Spring and Holiday standings since 2004, including runner-up finishes in both the 2007 and 2008 Winter/Spring meets. She also finished second at Ellis Park in 2007, tied for third at the 2007 Hoosier Park meet, and tied for second at the 2008 Indiana Downs meet.

Hammond lives in Salem, Illinois, where she runs her own 33-stall barn.

Larry Holt grew up riding horses, including some his uncle raced on the fair circuit. He had ambitions to become a jockey—Eddie Arcaro and Willie Shoemaker were his heroes—but he literally outgrew that dream and in 1972 took out his trainer's license. He never worked for anyone else but instead added a horse here and there on his own, starting with his uncle's string. His first win came in 1973 with a horse owned by his father-in-law. He earned his first stakes with Cattle Kate in the 1976 Banquet Bell Stakes at Thistledown. Among Holt's top horses have been Lackadaisical Lady, a filly that earned more than $100,000 "the hard way," and the stakes-winning filly Demitryst.

Today Holt maintains a mostly public stable and races primarily in Kentucky, Indiana, Ohio, and West Virginia. He operates his own training center, Holt Stables in Russell County, Kentucky, where he also breaks his own and clients yearlings.

As proud as he is of his horses, Holt is equally proud of his assistants who have gone on to successful careers of their own, including Joe Cain, Vince White, and Kevin Fletcher.

Horses define the lives of Eddie Kenneally and his family. His father broke horses and rode hunters, his uncle was a jump jockey who later trained for flat races and steeplechases, and his brother owns and operates Erinvale Thoroughbreds, one of the largest consignors in Australia and a specialist in broodmare management.

Employed by Camas Park Stud in his native Ireland, Kenneally moved to Kentucky in 1987 to prep horses for U.S. sales. The next year he began breaking yearlings and working at the racetrack, where he exercised horses for George "Rusty" Arnold and then became an assistant trainer for Tom Skiffington and Niall O'Callaghan. In 1994 Kenneally became a private trainer for Jack Kent Cooke's Elmendorf Farm. When Cooke died in 1997, Kenneally opened a public stable.

Kenneally won his first Turfway training title by saddling seven winners from 25 starters during the 2007 Fall Meet. Through mid-July 2008 he had 20 career stakes wins, 10 graded. One stable star was Bushfire, an Eclipse Award nominee who reeled off four stakes in 2006 including consecutive Grade I wins in the Ashland, Acorn, and Mother Goose. Another is Kelly's Landing, who broke his maiden at Turfway in 2004 before adding the Aristides (G3) in 2005, the Phoenix (G3) in 2006, and the Mr. Prospector (G3) and Dubai Golden Shaheen (G1) in 2007. Kenneally has a total of four stakes wins at Turfway, including two in 2007 with Mary Delaney, who also won the 2007 Vinery Madison (G2) at Keeneland.

Mike Maker learned the art and science of training from his father, George Maker, who trained at Detroit Race Course and Hazel Park in Michigan. Growing up around racing and later working as his father's assistant, Maker went out on his own with a few horses in 1991.

Maker next moved to the stable of trainer D. Wayne Lukas in 1993. He worked with the stable's string at Churchill Downs under Dallas Stewart, then an assistant to Lukas. When Stewart went out on his own in 1997, Maker took over as head of the operation in Louisville. He left the Lukas stable in 2003 to again open his own stable.

Maker's first "big horse" was Freefourinternet, who won the Hawthorne Gold Cup (G2) in 2004 and competed in the Breeders' Cup Classic that year. Recent stable stars include Cherokee Triangle, multiple stakes winner Dooze, and Just for Keeps, who won the 2008 Mamzelle Stakes at Churchill.

Maker earned his first Turfway training title in the 2007 Holiday Meet, saddling 12 winners from 38 starters. He followed that effort with a second title in the 2008 Winter/Spring Meet with 22 winners from 64 starters. Through mid-July 2008 Maker had 13 career stakes wins, including three at Turfway: the 2006 Lane's End Stakes (G2) with With a City, the 2008 Dust Commander with Self Made Man, and the 2008 Turfway Prevue with U. S. Cavalry.

Unlike many trainers, McGee didn't grow up on the backside of a racetrack, but he did spend a lot of time at the track with his dad, a racing fan. At 15 he started working as a hotwalker, later galloped horses, and has been at the track ever since.

Although McGee earned a degree in chemistry from Bellarmine University, he has never needed the backup plan. Through July 2008, he has a 19 percent win rate, more than $23 million in purse earnings, and 50 blacktype wins, 13 of them graded. He earned his first Grade I win in the 2000 Hollywood Starlet Stakes with I Believe in You.

Since 1991 McGee has 18 stakes wins at Turfway including the 2000 Kentucky Cup Juvenile Fillies with Miss Pickums, the 2002 Bourbonette with Colonial Glitter, and most recently the 2008 Hansel with Mitigation. He earned his first Turfway training title in the 2007 Winter/Spring Meet.

Among McGee's standouts are multiple graded stakes winner Suave (2004 Northern Dancer, 2005 Saratoga Breeders' Cup, 2006 Washington Park Handicap) and Grade I winner Honor in War (2002 Ack Ack, 2002 Gulfstream Park Sprint Championship, 2003 Woodford Reserve Turf Classic, 2003 Arlington Handicap). One of his brightest stars was Bet on Sunshine, third in the Breeders' Cup Sprint in 1997 and again in 2000 as an eight-year-old. Bet on Sunshine won 14 stakes before retiring in 2002 with career earnings of more than $1.4 million.

McGee is the brother of Marty McGee, national correspondent for Daily Racing Form. His sister, Amy, is married to Ron Ellis, a West Coast trainer.

David Pate earned his insights into training from a lifetime of working with horses, from the workhorses on his family’s 36,000-acre Georgia farm to the racehorses he rode as a jockey. Those insights and better stock paid off especially well in 2007-08 when he finished among Turfway's top 10 trainers during each of the track's three meets, averaging 23 percent winners and a 55 percent in-the-money rate.

Pate left the family farm at 19 to join his older brother at Ocala Stud in Florida, when the now-thriving racing center had just a few operations. He started as a hotwalker but had his eye on riding, and in 1968 at age 25 made his debut as a jockey.

Difficulty maintaining weight limited his career to three or four years but the experience opened the next door. "Once I started riding, I knew I wanted to train," he said. "I learned something from every trainer I ever rode for." Pate credits that time with giving him insight into what can happen to horses during a race. "I’m not so quick to blame the jockey when things don't go right," he said.

In 1972 Pate opened a small training stable at Tampa, eventually moving to Latonia. He closed the stable after about six years and signed on as assistant trainer with Marvin Moncrief's operation in Maryland. The time with Moncrief's 50-horse stable and the chance to make industry connections gave Pate the foundation he needed, and in 1988 he returned to Florida to open a stable with about 25 horses. Looking for options to suit the varying talents in his barn, he moved to the Ohio/Kentucky circuits, where he was leading trainer at River Downs in his first meet and a regular at Churchill Downs and Latonia, now Turfway Park.

Pate is a staunch fan of Polytrack and is based year-round at Turfway. He selects horses and trains primarily for James Skaggs's Spade Stable. He also trains horses he buys for his wife, Peggy, whose horsemanship he calls equal to his own. Pate describes his operation as a family-run business and proudly notes that three of his employees have been with him for 20 years.

Among Pate's memorable horses is his first stakes winner, Lawful Beat, a filly he bought with a partner for $4,700 and later sold for $125,000. Among his six stakes wins are two at Turfway, the 2003 Valdale with Unbridled Femme and the 2008 Queen with Pola's Place. He earned his first graded stakes win with Deputy G in the 2005 Bashford Manor (G3).

D. Michael "Speedy" Smithwick Jr. learned his craft at the highest levels. His father, D. Michael Smithwick Sr., is a Hall of Fame steeplechase trainer who trained for Mrs. Ogden Phipps. His mother also trains steeplechasers, and is grandfather was a breeder.

Despite his heritage, Smithwick hadn't planned to enter the family business. He began riding steeplechase races along the East Coast at 16 and by 18 was riding frequently, but after high school he entered college to study business. The racing bug had bitten deeper than he realized, however, and he kept riding as classes permitted. Eventually racing won out. He returned to riding full-time and then began training 'chasers as well.

Smithwick stopped riding when Jack Kent Cooke hired him as a private trainer in late 1991 and brought him to California. He came to Kentucky when Cooke relocated his operation to Elmendorf Farm in Lexington in 1995, and when Cooke died in 1997, Smithwick opened a public stable. Primarily based in Kentucky, he also has raced at the Colonial Downs meet for the past three years.

Smithwick tied with Greg Foley as Turfway's leading trainer in the 2006 Holiday Meet and in 2007 added leading trainer honors at the unique Kentucky Downs meet. Smithwick has 11 stakes wins including two graded events. Among his seven stakes wins at Turfway are the 2006 WEBN with Warrior Within; the 2007 Valdale with Our Dancing Babe; and the 2008 Likely Exchange with La Perouse.