Blacker Earns Graded Stripes With Hit the Road

California-based trainer Dan Blacker began his training career with just two horses in 2011. The British-born son of renown equine sculptor Phillip Blacker was a graduate of the third Darley Flying Start program, which fueled his desire to train on his own one day. Blacker scored the biggest success of his budding career thus far Feb. 6 when Hit the Road notched an impressive victory in the Thunder Road Stakes (G3T) at Santa Anita Park. Blacker has high hopes for the More Than Ready 4-year-old, with the Frank E. Kilroe Mile Stakes (G1T) penciled in on the colt's agenda. Blacker spoke with BloodHorse MarketWatch about Hit the Road, his start in the industry, and the positive transformation he's witnessed in California racing. MW: First of all, congratulations on your first graded stakes win with Hit the Road this past weekend in the Thunder Road Stakes (G3T) at Santa Anita Park. How did it feel to win your first graded stakes race? DB: It was very rewarding; a thrill for me, a big accomplishment, but I don't want to take anything away from the horse. He's a very unique and remarkable horse with a great group of owners to go along with it. MW: Hit the Road seems like he was a precocious 2-year-old, breaking his maiden in July of that year. Did you always feel like he had the potential to become a stakes horse early on? DB: He's the complete package of a racehorse. He's got a great mind. I think when people talk about a precocious horse, they think about how they look and what that physical body type, what a forward type-looking horse will look like. But for him it was all the mental aspect. Raul Reyes from King's Equine broke him in Ocala, Fla., and he kind of flew under Raul's radar there because he didn't show a lot of speed. When he came to me at the track he was always very smart and precocious mentally. He learned and did everything very easily. And he got ready to run very quickly. MW: What stood out about Hit the Road as a yearling at the 2018 Keeneland September Yearling Sale? DB: He was a smallish yearling. Horses like him that are grass horses that are a little small just kind of slip through the cracks. I think at that point in the sale (Book 1) most of the buyers are there looking for a two-turn dirt horse that could be a stallion prospect. Boomer (Craig Rounsefell) was the one I give all the credit to—he really loved the horse. He was a lovely mover and had a great temperament. I like having a grass horse just as much as a dirt horse. He just looked like an athlete to us. We really looked when he RNA'd, and we were able to buy him back at the barn out of the ring. MW: Seeing as Hit the Road is by More Than Ready, have you had success with More Than Readys in the past? DB: I haven't had many to be honest, but I certainly like the stallion now. I always thought he was a great stallion, but they've always been tough to buy at the sale. I bought another filly this year for another owner who's by More Than Ready that we have high hopes for. She's in Ocala now and doing really well. I'm excited about her. MW: After a fourth-place effort in the Cecil B. DeMille Stakes (G3T), Hit the Road didn't start again until five months later, winning his only two starts as a 3-year-old, including the (Runhappy) Oceanside Stakes. He then proceeded to go seven months before winning the Thunder Road. That's a pretty lengthy layoff. Why didn't he start again after the Oceanside? DB: Well, he did pick up a minor injury after the Oceanside. I spoke with the owners and we decided then that the best thing for him was to give him time off and race him when he was 100%. And we just gave him a proper break at the farm. And now he's come back, and thankfully, rewarded us. Now we can see what he can do when he's at his best. He's just a very talented horse and runs good fresh. MW: What are your plans with Hit the Road looking forward to the rest of the season? DB: I would love to try to win a grade 1 with him. I believe he can win a grade 1. He obviously loves California and the firm turf here. The next race I'm aiming for is the Frank E. Kilroe Mile (G1T) March 6. We'll just let the horse tell us if he's ready. It is coming back in four weeks. He certainly came out of the race in good shape, and he's got great energy right now. MW: How did you get into racing? Did you always want to become a trainer? DB: I grew up around horses. My father (Phillip Blacker) was a steeplechase jockey before I was born and then he became an artist. He's actually one of the most foremost equine artist in the world. His most famous sculpture is of Northern Dancer at Woodbine. I went to college studying environmental science and riding out for trainers but hadn't quite decided what I wanted to do as a career path at that point yet. And when I graduated I heard about Darley Flying Start, which was in its infancy as a program at that point. I applied for the third intake and luckily I got in, and it changed my world. I got to travel around the world and work with different trainers. MW: How did you end up moving permanently to the United States? DB: I worked for Richard Mandella here in California and just loved everything about it. The racetrack way of life and the American way of life. There was just way more opportunities for me here to get going on my own and that's how I ended up here. MW: Who were your main influences as a trainer? DB: Richard Mandella and Tom Albertrani. I worked for Tom for a few years in New York, and he was a great guy and great horseman. He taught me a lot of things as well in my time going back and forth between New York, Florida, and Kentucky. MW: I see you took your training license out in 2011. How did you start training? DB: I came out to California and my friend Jamie Lloyd, who is now a bloodstock agent, was leaving the training ranks at Santa Anita, and he suggested I take over and a couple owners were kind enough to give me a shot, and I started off with two horses. There's nowhere else in the world that you can do that. It's unique here in America. Young trainers have a chance here. If you're passionate and you're driven and you prove to people that you want to do it, and you're good at what you do, people will give you a chance no matter what age you are. MW: How many horses do you currently have in the barn? DB: Twenty-eight. It's taken a few years to build up but it seems like we're heading in the right direction now. MW: Do you see yourself permanently based in California? What are the challenges and benefits of racing in California? DB: Yes. I love California. I'll admit we've had some tough times since I started training. I started training at Hollywood Park and now that track is a stadium where they are going to have the Super Bowl next year. And another thing is we've had a lot of bad publicity with horses getting hurt here. Luckily in recent years, there was a management change that was the major catalyst behind a culture change at Santa Anita and in California. I don't think Belinda Stronach gets enough credit for coming in and saying enough is enough, and we need to change. She and Aidan Butler came in and said, 'We're going to turn this around.' They did a remarkable job in assessing every single problem in why horses were breaking down where no one had done that before. I don't think horse safety was high enough on the agenda in the past and now it is. Aidan and his team really accomplished something over here and everyone is on board. The veterinarians, the trainers, everyone at Santa Anita has the same goal and that's to produce safe racing and a great product. I think the public is responding well, but it's going to take time. I feel very proud to be a trainer in California where I didn't five or six years ago. Now we are statistically among the safest tracks in the whole country. Our next real hurdle in California is the horse population. The thing that we need to improve is horse population and that's owners sending horses out to California, not just to Dan Blacker, but to everyone, and that's what's going to make us thrive. When the Breeders' Cup (World Championships) is on, Santa Anita is the best place to have it. I've been to all of them, and there is just something about the Breeders' Cup at Santa Anita that is just so unique and special. It would be such a shame for that to ever go away.