The Michael Gill/Penn National Riders Saga

[GBBob]

Originally Posted by The Indomitable DrugS

It's hard to suspect him of doing anything right with his Philly Park division ... he's winning at 6% with over 100 starters over the last few months ... and wasn't exactly making much of an impression before that.

Then he's truly an azzhole....can't even run horses into the ground the right way

[Rudeboyelvis]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

at $50 per day and 120 horses that is over $2.1 million for those horses alone. And that is before vets, farm salaries, shipping, workmans comp, purchase prices, maintenance and other expenses at the farm, etc. An operation done semi-right of that size with a farm would cost $4-5 million. He ran 2247 horses last year so you can pretty much double all the figures since with a 120 horse operation it would mean his horses averaged close to 19 starts each. He states in the Paulick article today he had 450 horses last year at one time. The day he had 450 horses at say $50 a day it was costing him $22000 a day without the other expenses factored in. That is around 8 million in expenses without regard to one cent of purchase price.

You can't argue the general to the specific and vice versa. I have no idea what this guy does, but would imagine his expenses are not near 50.00 a day per horse unless he is stabling every horse at the track (which he is not) and further have no idea what he pays his program trainers to run them. Slot money is gargantuan with respect to traditional models...Obviously he'd be losing his shirt running 5k races for 7500 like here in Tampa, but 4x + purses are crazy and certainly pays for the balance of the ones that don't pan out or, unfortunately, drop dead.

[Danzig]

Originally Posted by Thoroughbred Fan

He may worm them, he may give them meds for EPM, he may change their diet, he may change their shoes. It is all legit, but also subterfuge for whatever is really going on.

He still wins a a great rate which is not always explained by those things. He places them aggressively and may be an alchemist. What ever he does...he will always be suspected of wrong.
No sympathy for him, but it must be tough to be him.

seeing as how he once had a vet cut the leg off a horse, he's got no one to blame but himself for that. a reputation is certainly more easy to ruin than to repair. i don't feel bad for him, but i do feel bad for the horses in his...ahem...'care'.

[freddymo]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

at $50 per day and 120 horses that is over $2.1 million for those horses alone. And that is before vets, farm salaries, shipping, workmans comp, purchase prices, maintenance and other expenses at the farm, etc. An operation done semi-right of that size with a farm would cost $4-5 million. He ran 2247 horses last year so you can pretty much double all the figures since with a 120 horse operation it would mean his horses averaged close to 19 starts each. He states in the Paulick article today he had 450 horses last year at one time. The day he had 450 horses at say $50 a day it was costing him $22000 a day without the other expenses factored in. That is around 8 million in expenses without regard to one cent of purchase price.

This is horrendous math.. Think

[The Indomitable DrugS]

Originally Posted by GBBob

Then he's truly an azzhole....can't even run horses into the ground the right way

The vast majority of those same horses would be run in the ground anyway with or without a Mike Gill owning them.

People say about the true alchemists "but horses don't break down for them at an appallingly high rate" .... but what happens when your ordinary trainer claims from them - or gets one transferred to them?

Yep, said horse goes on to fall off of the face of the planet at an appallingly high and fast rate.

I love that reasoning ... 'so and so does get huge form reversals, does wins races at eye-popping percentages, does generate a long term flat bet profit on the betting dollar even though everyone overbets the form of their horses .. this is all true ... but they don't breakdown for them .. they just often breakdown not long after they leave'

[freddymo]

Originally Posted by Rudeboyelvis

You can't argue the general to the specific and vice versa. I have no idea what this guy does, but would imagine his expenses are not near 50.00 a day per horse unless he is stabling every horse at the track (which he is not) and further have no idea what he pays his program trainers to run them. Slot money is gargantuan with respect to traditional models...Obviously he'd be losing his shirt running 5k races for 7500 like here in Tampa, but 4x + purses are crazy and certainly pays for the balance of the ones that don't pan out or, unfortunately, drop dead.

Gill is NOT losing money he may not be earning and he might be reporting several hundred k in loses BUT he is earning.. This is not an ego trip as for 4k a nite his ego can be rubbed and tugged to golry

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by Rudeboyelvis

You can't argue the general to the specific and vice versa. I have no idea what this guy does, but would imagine his expenses are not near 50.00 a day per horse unless he is stabling every horse at the track (which he is not) and further have no idea what he pays his program trainers to run them. Slot money is gargantuan with respect to traditional models...Obviously he'd be losing his shirt running 5k races for 7500 like here in Tampa, but 4x + purses are crazy and certainly pays for the balance of the ones that don't pan out or, unfortunately, drop dead.

You cant be serious since you know what it costs to have horses. I mean do the math. He said he had over 450 horses last year. If he spent an average of 10k on each that is over 4 million right there. You really think you can run that many horses for less than $50 a day with vet included?If his prerace including Lasix was $50 per starter which is very light, would be over 110k for that alone. It isnt really close as I have drastically understated his expenses for the most part. The $6 million he earned is a gross number as well. Even if the trainers work for less than 10%, you still have the jocks earnings to pull from there.

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by freddymo

This is horrendous math.. Think

Give me a break. He loses money. It is pretty obvious to anyone who knows how much things cost.

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by freddymo

Gill is NOT losing money he may not be earning and he might be reporting several hundred k in loses BUT he is earning.. This is not an ego trip as for 4k a nite his ego can be rubbed and tugged to golry

You are as correct about this as you were about Paragallo.

[freddymo]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

You cant be serious since you know what it costs to have horses. I mean do the math. He said he had over 450 horses last year. If he spent an average of 10k on each that is over 4 million right there. You really think you can run that many horses for less than $50 a day with vet included?If his prerace including Lasix was $50 per starter which is very light, would be over 110k for that alone. It isnt really close as I have drastically understated his expenses for the most part. The $6 million he earned is a gross number as well. Even if the trainers work for less than 10%, you still have the jocks earnings to pull from there.

I pay 15 for lasix.. Michael gill is not cutting a chx for 40k a week to race 5 claimers. I do not think he wakes up in the moring and says"Hi, my name is Michael Gill, and love Penn National and because I love Penn Nat I will deposit 6k into an account and look forward to doing the same tomorrow" Come on Chuck 2 mil a year is ridiculous .. Gill is not a complete fn moron.

[freddymo]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

You are as correct about this as you were about Paragallo.

You figure he is getting his rocks off of 40k a week?

[The Indomitable DrugS]

By the way .... this was my favorite line from the PR....

He has fired Darrel Delahoussaye, the trainer of Laughing Moon. “They (Penn National) put a gun to my head, and someone had to take the bullet,” he said. “I feel bad about this. But if I lose the (49) stalls at Penn National, I’m out of business.”

Losing Delahoussaye had to feel like losing a sore tooth.

He was one of the most brutally bad trainers I've ever seen at Mountaineer. There are two different kinds of 5% trainers at Mountaineer.. the sneaky not-so-bad ones who have a barn full of nothing but hopeless rats and are 20/1 most of the time .. or the Darrel Delahoussaye kind who just suck dog crap through a straw.

I remember another MTR trainer telling me over the summer about how he "loads them up with everything" ... I told him "does the stuff he loads them up with make them want to stop running when they see the 1/4 pole?"

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by freddymo

I pay 15 for lasix.. Michael gill is not cutting a chx for 40k a week to race 5 claimers. I do not think he wakes up in the moring and says"Hi, my name is Michael Gill, and love Penn National and because I love Penn Nat I will deposit 6k into an account and look forward to doing the same tomorrow" Come on Chuck 2 mil a year is ridiculous .. Gill is not a complete fn moron.

I am always amused/amazed when you doubt what I know to be true with a "he cant be that dumb" theory. Gill figured out early that in order to be a bigshot in the game that he had to do something that noone else WANTED to do. He knew he had no shot to compete with the big money for good horses and he in a sick way got what he wanted which is attention. Face it, if Gill spend 5 or 6 million dollars a year trying to buy good horses he would hardly be as well known as he is without a tremendous amount of luck. He is doing what Englander did before him. Winning lots of races is not that hard if you are willing to lose money.

[Rudeboyelvis]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

You cant be serious since you know what it costs to have horses. I mean do the math. He said he had over 450 horses last year. If he spent an average of 10k on each that is over 4 million right there. You really think you can run that many horses for less than $50 a day with vet included?If his prerace including Lasix was $50 per starter which is very light, would be over 110k for that alone. It isnt really close as I have drastically understated his expenses for the most part. The $6 million he earned is a gross number as well. Even if the trainers work for less than 10%, you still have the jocks earnings to pull from there.

I know what it costs to keep an 8 claimer in Tampa - running that same race at Penn Nat for 20K, a win = 12K, minus jock and trainer covers me for the meet. 4 months of 55 a day + vet + shoes if I don't hit the board the rest of the meet, I'm pretty much to the good. Extrapolate that over the course of Gill's deal, it doesn't seem like a losing proposition. All I'm sayin'...I've had plenty that never made it to the track.

BTW - Purrfect Bluff in on Friday at AQU - looks good

[The Indomitable DrugS]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

I am always amused/amazed when you doubt what I know to be true with a "he cant be that dumb" theory. Gill figured out early that in order to be a bigshot in the game that he had to do something that noone else WANTED to do. He knew he had no shot to compete with the big money for good horses and he in a sick way got what he wanted which is attention. Face it, if Gill spend 5 or 6 million dollars a year trying to buy good horses he would hardly be as well known as he is without a tremendous amount of luck. He is doing what Englander did before him. Winning lots of races is not that hard if you are willing to lose money.

Is Englander still a jockeys agent?

It's way more about being addicted to the game and wanting action than anything else.

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by Rudeboyelvis

I know what it costs to keep an 8 claimer in Tampa - running that same race at Penn Nat for 20K, a win = 12K, minus jock and trainer covers me for the meet. 4 months of 55 a day + vet + shoes if I don't hit the board the rest of the meet, I'm pretty much to the good. Extrapolate that over the course of Gill's deal, it doesn't seem like a losing proposition. All I'm sayin'...I've had plenty that never made it to the track.

BTW - Purrfect Bluff in on Friday at AQU - looks good

How about this math to really simplify it. If using the 450 horse number he gave, his horses averaged 14k in earnings a year. Think you can keep a horse for 14k a year? Obviously this is a simplistic view but what about the ones that dont earn? If you had 2 horses and the other earned nothing would that 12k pay for him too?

[The Indomitable DrugS]

Originally Posted by freddymo

You really think this is ALL about trainers being pissed that Gill is winning races? They voted the woman/trainer above president, you just proved that she is grabbing a ton of the pie. So they hate Gill because he is taking the Pie and like Beattie? I dont get it..

Maybe this might help ...

Layne Giliforte Says:

March 7, 2009 at 10:17 pm | Reply

I personally have been the beneficiary of 11 of his astute claims and can tell you I am not sour grapes. That proof is apparent by the fact that of 11 horses he has taken off me in about 8 months, he has had 3 wins and is making money with NONE of them. But what I can admit to is that the arrogant, ego maniac is dramatically affecting my business as well as directly affecting my family, children and my employees and their families. Is this a good guy? I guy we need in our sport? I don’t think he is a guy we need in our society but unfortunately that’s something we can’t do anything about. But I can also ask, is he a family man? If so, how we he feel if his family and children were directly being torn apart by one person’s obsession with his own ego? I can honestly say I hope he finds out someday.

By the way .. that was from March ... since May, he's claimed 13 more horses off of Giliforte.

That's a combined total of 24 claims - of which he probably did Giliforte's owner about 21 or 22 favors... but he did Giliforte himself and his operation no favors.

The 13 taken from Giliforte since May are more than any other trainer. Wonder Juicer/HBPA President Steph Beattie is 2nd in the Gill claiming crosshairs... she's had 11 taken from her by Gill over that same span.

[hockey2315]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

How about this math to really simplify it. If using the 450 horse number he gave, his horses averaged 14k in earnings a year. Think you can keep a horse for 14k a year? Obviously this is a simplistic view but what about the ones that dont earn? If you had 2 horses and the other earned nothing would that 12k pay for him too?

But does he own each of those horses for the entire year?

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by hockey2315

But does he own each of those horses for the entire year?

of course not but when you factor in what it costs to purchase/claim each horse then how much earnings are there left? Not to mention the purse number used was a gross number not the net so the actual money to him from each horse is cut even further. If you use $7500 as the avg cost of each horse after you subtract the commissions from the 14k number you have about $11400 and then subtract the $7500 claim price and you have about 4k per horse. Since we have no idea how many were claimed off of him or what amount he got back the 4k number is low but probably not too low since it seems like he claims 10-12 horses for each one claimed off of him. I realize these are approximations but the reality isnt that far off especially since his horses usually have little residual value. You cannot make money running this kind of operation because there is no windfall, little residual value and far too many basic expenses.

[freddymo]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

of course not but when you factor in what it costs to purchase/claim each horse then how much earnings are there left? Not to mention the purse number used was a gross number not the net so the actual money to him from each horse is cut even further. If you use $7500 as the avg cost of each horse after you subtract the commissions from the 14k number you have about $11400 and then subtract the $7500 claim price and you have about 4k per horse. Since we have no idea how many were claimed off of him or what amount he got back the 4k number is low but probably not too low since it seems like he claims 10-12 horses for each one claimed off of him. I realize these are approximations but the reality isnt that far off especially since his horses usually have little residual value. You cannot make money running this kind of operation because there is no windfall, little residual value and far too many basic expenses.

So basically he knows he is going to lose a few million a year, never have a windfall(I agree) and simply does it as a business to lose 40k a week. This makes sense to whom? Not Gill!