BALTIMORE — Tugging on the curtain concealing the trainer of Fenwick, the longest shot in Saturday's Preakness Stakes, provides a hodgepodge of clues like a jeans pocket, ripped shirt and disturbing stories about thumbs.
In more than three decades, Kevin McKathan, of Ocala, Fla., has placed perhaps one horse under his name as a licensed trainer. His best guess is 10, 11 years ago, though he's not sure on either of the points, which also have slipped the mind of electronic racing bible Equibase.
Now, McKathan has a horse munching hay in a barn at Pimlico Race Course with a Triple Crown race looming.
Back to those thumbs and their concerning standing among those who truly get dusty and dirty in the horse world. When you're roping things and hanging with the rodeo crowd, it's a digit in danger.
"I almost cut this (right) thumb off with a rope," McKathan said Friday, explaining how a coiled section connected to an uncooperative animal heightens awareness. "We were ropin' steers about 15 years ago. You can see the scar. That's the most common problem ropin' — poppin' your thumb off."
McKathan snaps his fingers.
"They come off just like that," he said. "I had a glove on. When you take the glove off, you're like, is the thumb going with it? Or is it still there? I've been in many pens where the guy just steps off his horse, picks his thumb up and goes to get it sewed back on."
The story is delivered matter-of-factly, as if it's simply the price of cowboy poker from time to time.
McKathan is the man behind horse racing's absurd dream of back-to-back, "Do you believe in miracles!" moments in search of the Al Michaels soundtrack. Fenwick stands 50-1 on the morning line, an afterthought amid the entries of blue-blooded, monied heavyweights like Steve Asmussen, Chad Brown and Doug O'Neill.
Two weeks ago, an 80-1 horse named Rich Strike navigated the Kentucky Derby's brutal in-race traffic like someone zipping through peak rush hour on I-15. Then the team behind the colt slammed the brakes, making the unlikeliest of the unlikely on the first Saturday in May the first Derby winner since Spend a Buck in 1985 to abandon a Triple Crown run because of owner decision.
That leaves unflappable optimists Fenwick and McKathan, with imprints of two chewing tobacco can rings forever intertwined like two-fifths of an Olympic logo on that back pocket.
"If you're in the business and industry, you know you can be outrun by any horse if it has the right trip on the right day," said McKathan, 54. "All you need to do is be between the fences."
McKathan, who playfully labels himself a "Florida hillbilly," developed a gleam in his eye for Fenwick, whose father Curlin won the 2007 Preakness and $10 million along his racing way.
The $52,000 purchase at the Fasig-Tipton Kentucky Fall Yearling Sale of 2020 has pocketed $53,840 in his career, or mere wood shavings in the universe of horses who end up in Triple Crown races.
McKathan and ownership tried to sell Fenwick at a 2-year-old sale in March of last year, but the horse underperformed and failed to command a price of up to $1 million that a pedigree of his kind can bring.
Fast forward to April 9, when Fenwick broke the gate in the Grade I Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland in Lexington, Ky. A troubled trip led to him tumbling to last place in the 11-horse field.
Hence, 50-1.
The visit to Keeneland offered another sliver of insight into McKathan and his low-key ways. He was not allowed into the trackside box reserved for race teams because he lacked the one thing that opened the door.
"They said you're not going to get to your box unless you wear a tie," he said. "I said, 'That's going to be a problem, because I don't have one.' If you want to get up where the fancy people are, you can't come up there like a hillbilly.
"So, Jeremia ran out and bought me a tie."
That's Jeremia Rudan, a Canadian businessman and rookie along the Triple Crown trail. He's the co-owner of Fenwick, along with Michael Kimel, who moonlights as a crisis shopping expert.
"Yeah, I did," said Rudan, confirming the last-second sprint. "There was a mall there. It was maybe a Dillard's or JCPenney."
Standing by the barn Friday as he told the story, Rudan could not help but point out the small, square-shaped rip on the left sleeve of McKathan's shirt. The opening revealed a portion of a tattoo detailing his connection to Derby winners American Pharoah, Real Quiet and Silver Charm.
McKathan's main focus during his career has been breaking and working with young horses before baton-passing the best to elite trainers like Bob Baffert, who won Derbies with the trio.
If dress and demeanor scream "aw shucks," McKathan's fingerprints on those type of mammoth winners tell the story of his singular abilities for him.
"He's a cowboy, for sure," said Rudan, 37. "He wears boots. He ropes. He chews snuff. He's that guy. But he grew up around horses. That's what he knows. That's his life.
"There's a documentary of when American Pharoah won the Triple Crown. (The McKathans) basically broke him and trained him before sending him to Baffert in California. I called him up and didn't think he'd talk to me, because he has a big reputation. But he did."
Special fails to adequately explain the Preakness moment for McKathan, who lost brother J.B. three years ago and his father, Luke, in February.
The three worked alongside each other endlessly.
"My brother, it was a heart attack out of the blue," McKathan said. "We breezed 100 horses on a Saturday morning and on Sunday, he was gone. I think they'd both be proud that we're taking a shot at this. They're definitely looking down smiling.
"I sure hope they're not looking down laughing."
A day before the Preakness, McKathan's world remained surprisingly uncomplicated. If there's pressure or stress building toward eruption, it's impossible to tell.
"The Holiday Inn I'm staying in has a Chili's in it," he said. "I'm there most every night."
Pass the chips and queso and, just maybe, a healthy side of history.
And keep Al Michaels handy, just in case.
Intersection of Preakness, Easy streets?
Fenwick co-owner Jeremia Rudan shook his head at a Preakness Stakes-sized sign he received this week. Rudan, of Niagara Falls, Ontario, was at a stoplight in his hometown when he looked up.
In front of him was the name of the crossing roadway … Preakness Street.
"I've lived in Niagara Falls my whole life," Rudan said Friday at Pimlico Race Course. "I look up and the name of the road is Preakness Street. I've never ever seen that street name in my whole life. This is a street I drive up and down all the time. The pharmacy I go to is on this street and I've never noticed it.
"I took a picture and sent it to (trainer) Kevin (McKathan) and said, 'This is crazy.' "
Fenwick stood 50-1 on the morning line, the longest odds for Saturday's Triple Crown race.
— Bryce Miller
