D. Wayne Lukas, Trainer Who Saddled 15 Triple Crown Winners, Dies at 89

D. Wayne Lukas, a Hall of Fame trainer who saddled the winners of 15 Triple Crown and 20 Breeders’ Cup races and who revolutionized thoroughbred racing with a modern-day corporate approach in a career spanning nearly 50 years, died on Saturday at his home in Louisville, Ky. He was 89.

His family announced the death in a statement released by Churchill Downs, the Kentucky Derby racetrack. They had said in June that he had been treated for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, a serious bacterial skin infection.

Lukas evoked the image of an Old West cowboy when he donned a white Stetson and leather chaps to survey his stables, often arriving at 4:30 a.m. or so to make sure his horses were fit and the grounds were groomed to the immaculate standards he insisted upon. When it was time for training, he would escort his charges on horseback.

But he was also an astute businessman who attended races in designer suits and aviator shades and had horses in training from coast to coast.

He forged relationships with wealthy owners who would spend millions on premium horses, stocking stables across the country manned by his assistants. The goal was simple — win the sport’s biggest races — and he regularly flew across the country and did so. Handicappers took note, giving rise to the phrase “D. Wayne off the plane.”

One of Lukas’s biggest clients in his early years as a thoroughbred trainer was the former San Diego Chargers owner Eugene Klein. In 1988, his filly Winning Colors gave Lukas his first Kentucky Derby victory.