Back in 2017, the future looked bright for Wendell Fong. 

That it’s still bright today is the result of an unlikely confluence of circumstances and people combining to give the gelding a soft landing.

After selling as a weanling for $47,000, he was purchased for $160,000 ten months later by Al Gold, who has campaigned such graded stakes winners as Cyberknife, Chace City, and Instant Coffee.

Wendell Fong broke his maiden first out for trainer Jeremiah Englehart, winning by a nose at Laurel Park. Trained by Englehart, Robertino Diodoro, Natalia Lynch, and Chad Summers over the course of his career with Gold Square, the dark bay/brown by Flat Out compiled a record of 22-3-3-3 for his first owner, including a second-place finish in the Grade 3 Tom Fool Handicap in March of 2021 and wins in the Gold Fever at Belmont Park and Fire Plug at Laurel. 

He made over $300,000 for Gold Square, according to Equibase statistics.

“I worked for Jeremiah when Wendell first got shipped to the barn,” said Lynch. “I first met him when he was a two-year-old and shipped down to Laurel.”

“He was just another horse in the barn,” she recalled. “He always wanted to bite, and he was kind of annoying. He came flying up and won his first start, and at the time I was galloping him, and we kind of bonded from there.”

When Lynch went out on her own in 2020, Gold gave her horses to train, and one of them was Wendell Fong. 

“It was so cool to have him back,” she said. “I ran him twice, and he didn’t run well, and the owner wanted to drop him in for a tag. I begged him for one more shot, and he said OK.”

Based in New York, Lynch ran second with the horse in an allowance at Laurel, and then entered him in the January 2021 Fire Plug Stakes.

“It was during Covid, so I couldn’t go down to Maryland,” said Lynch. “Brittany Russell ran him for me, and [Russell’s husband] Sheldon rode him.” 

Sent off at 6-1, Wendell Fong broke well from post 1, and then stumbled and nearly fell on his face, heading up the backstretch. Watch the replay, keep your eyes on the 1, and you’ll see him briefly disappear shortly after the start. It’s a startling visual, even three years later and knowing that the horse was OK. 

[WATCH: Wendell Fong wins the Fire Plug]

He and the jockey managed to right themselves, but they trailed by nearly 10 lengths, a lot to overcome even for a horse that liked to come off the pace. 

“Somehow,” said Lynch, “he circled the field, and he won. It was my first winner, and it was a stakes race. I had been about to get fired from him, and since then, he’s always held this place in my heart.” 

He ran second in the Tom Fool Stakes next out and was away from the track for nearly eight months, and when he returned, he had a new trainer, Chad Summers.

Wendell Fong and Lynch next crossed paths in the summer of 2022, when the horse was entered for a tag for the first time, for $40,000 at Saratoga. 

“I kept getting all these texts from people. ‘Are you going to claim your boy?’” Lynch remembered. “I didn’t have $40,000, but all of a sudden, I got phone calls from a few people who said that we should put together a partnership and drop on him.” 

Three other entities also dropped a slip for him, and the racing office was packed when the claim slips were drawn. Lynch and Dark Horse Racing Stable won the shake.

“We knew that Talie really knew the horse, so we gave him back to her,” said Brian Hahn, managing partner of Dark Horse, which owned the horse in partnership with Serio Racing Stables, Rich Spiesman, Corms Racing Stable, and Lynch.  “Some of our partners called him ‘duck face’ because of his blaze.”

Wendell Fong raced eight times with Lynch as his trainer, winning once and coming in third in a stakes race at Parx. He last raced for her on May 2, 2023. 

In late 2023, Lynch was suspended for four years by the Horseracing Integrity and Welfare Unit after a horse of hers tested positive for Altrenogest, which controls estrus in fillies and mares and is prohibited for use on male horses, such as the Lynch-trained Motion to Strike. She also was found to be in possession of levothyroxine, a banned substance which controls metabolism. 

With Lynch facing suspension, Wendell Fong’s owners kept him in New York, sending him to trainer Ray Handal, who ran him once, then down to Maryland to the barn of Keri Brion. 

“He came down to Fair Hill and we freshened him up,” said Brion, watching her horses train over the Oklahoma track in Saratoga Springs. “He was super happy. He’s a super-cool horse to be around. 

“I love to take older horses to Fair Hill and see them come to life. He really enjoyed himself there, and when we raced him, it was obvious that he just no longer wanted to do it.” 

Wendell Fong raced twice for Brion, and she had planned to retire him after that second start, in early November of last year. 

Except: he got claimed. Again. For $40,000.

Trainer Jamie Ness and new owners Madison Avenue Racing Stable and Ness’s own Jagger Inc. gave the 7-year-old eight months off. They gelded him, and they tended to what Ness described as a series of minor injuries, like quarter cracks and cracked heels.

“I’d always liked the horse,” said Ness. “He’s a hard knocker, and he was worth what we paid for him. He wasn’t sore at all. He just couldn’t stay healthy.”

In July, eight months after his prior start, Ness and the owners brought Wendell Fong back to the races, dropping him in for a $5,000 tag at Delaware Park. The horse finished second, and was claimed, again. This time it didn’t matter, though, because the claim was voided by a state veterinarian for unsoundness. 

As it happened, several people had been watching, and scrambling to find a way to claim the old gelding and retire him.

“That’s when we jumped into action,” said Brion. “[Trainer] Brittany Russell called Jamie [Ness], and she told him that his former connections wanted to buy the horse back. Jamie said that he wanted to give the horse away to a good home, and I called him and told him that his former owners would love to have the horse back. And he said, ‘He’s yours. You can pick him up tomorrow morning.’” 

“We tried to put in a claim for him in his last race,” said Hahn, one of his former owners. “We’ve done that with a bunch of our horses. We felt like he was getting up there in age, but we were in New York and we didn’t get the claim down to Delaware in time.” 

Watching from Florida, Lynch wasn’t in a position to spend $5,000 on a horse to claim him, but after the claim was voided, she got a call from Brion.

“‘If I can get Wendell back, do you want him?’” Lynch recalled. “It felt like it was meant to be.” 

Dr. Patty Hogan had known the horse since he was a juvenile, and she volunteered to look him over and let him down at her clinic and farm in New Jersey. That’s where he’s been for the last month.

“There’s just something about him,” said Hogan. “I first met him when he was two, and I always kept him in my DRF horse watch. When I saw that he went into a $5,000 claiming race, I called a vet there to try to claim him.”

Now eight years old, Wendell Fong made 34 starts, for a record of 5-4-4. He earned $379,260.

“He’s in remarkably good physical condition,” said Hogan. “He’s got some feet problems and some ankle issues, but he’s in great shape.” 

Dark Horse Racing paid for Wendell Fong’s stay at Brion’s Fair Hill barn until the horse could get to Hogan’s clinic, and Hogan is providing the horse’s care without charge. 

“She is so great for the sport,” said Hahn of Hogan. “She does so much behind the scenes to help horses, doing surgeries and putting horses up. And Keri didn’t even have the horse for very long, so kudos to her for keeping tabs on him and helping to make this happen.” 

“Fair play to Jamie,” said Brion. “He did all the right things by the horse, and then he just gave him to us, which was really nice.” 

As for Lynch, she’s effusively grateful to everyone who had something to do with getting Wendell Fong back to her. 

“I was hoping that this would happen someday,” she said. “He and my son are the same age, and I have pictures of my two-year-old son Joey on two-year-old Wendell Fong’s back. I used to ride him bareback in the afternoons, when the horses were getting fed. He’s been part of my family, and knowing that he’s safe and going to end up back with me is the most important and sentimental thing I could ask for. I owe him everything.”

WENDELL FONG GALLERY

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