Lukas invites little girl into winner's circle

When Hall of Fame trainer D. Wayne Lukas wins a horse race, he does something

with little fanfare that leaves a strong impression, and it was no different

Sunday when his two-year-old filly Broken Spell rallied to break her maiden in

the 5TH race on the turf at Saratoga.

Heading to the winner's circle, Lukas spotted a young girl with her family

and asked if she would like to join him in the post-race photo.

"I do it every time I win a race," Lukas said Monday morning. "That's been

going on for years. What I do is I get a perfect stranger. I just walk up to

somebody standing there with their family, a five, six or seven-year-old, and

say, 'Let's get our picture taken with this winning horse.' And I take them

there, and they get so excited.

"The beautiful thing is that they're at the races and they see all the

horses, but they don't get that close to one. I take them back to the parents

and say, 'If you wait about 20 minutes, you can go by the photographer's office

and there will be a free copy of that on my account for you.' It's great for the

photographer because they get my free one, and they get one for each grandparent

and their Aunt Nelly and everybody else, so the photographers get a hell of a

bonus out of it."

Lukas said the little girl he brought down to the winner's circle Sunday

innocently asked him, "'What do you do here?' And I said, 'I work here. I take

care of the horses.' And she said, 'Oh, good. Can I touch him?' And I said,

'When he gets here, we'll take the saddle off and you can touch him.' She has no

idea that I have ever won a race any other place or even knew anything about the

horse."

Lukas said he got in the habit of taking kids to the winner's circle at

Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs, Arkansas, and wishes more trainers would do it.

"It takes no time, it's pleasant for me, and I think it develops a public

relations thing that you couldn't duplicate if you spent all night trying to

think of something," he said.

"I was standing there at the Derby this year, and this kid comes walking up

and says, 'Do you remember me?' And his parents were standing back; he came by

himself. We shook hands, and I said, 'No, I don't remember you. Should I?' And

he said, 'Oh, yeah. We had our picture taken together last year. I have it up on

my bulletin board.'

"You can't produce that kind of PR," Lukas said. "We need more of that. It's

so easy to do."

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