Mindframe’s Half-Brother is an Intriguing Prospect

[Wandering Eyes]

Michael Trombetta, the long-time trainer for the late Larry Johnson, visited the owner's farm in 2022 to inspect the new crop of yearlings and was struck by one in particular. The yearling was Mindframe (Constitution).

“The first time I saw Mindframe, he just stood out like a sore thumb,” Trombetta said.

But Trombetta knew then that he would not get the chance to train the horse who went on to win the GI Stephen Foster Stakes, the GI Churchill Downs Stakes and finish second in the GI Belmont Stakes. According to Trombetta, Johnson was spending about $1 million alone each year on stud fees and would help pay the bills by taking his best three or four prospects to the sales.

“I knew I'd never be the trainer of that horse,” Trombetta said. “Larry would always cherry-pick a handful of horses that he thought were good enough to go to the sales. Larry's words–and I can still hear them in my head all the time–were, 'sometimes we have to take some chips off the table.' He had to help fund everything. He had to be able to fund his operation properly.”

Johnson wasn't wrong. Mindframe was sold at the 2022 Keeneland September Sale for $600,000, and was purchased by the partnership of Repole Stable and St. Elias Stables LLC.

But while it was Todd Pletcher, and not Trombetta, who guided the career of Mindframe, Trombetta now has the next best thing in his barn. He is the trainer of Mindframe's soon-to-be 4-year-old half-brother, Lonesome Road (Maclean's Music). In his third lifetime start and his first on the dirt, Lonesome Road ran off the screen in a Dec. 26 maiden at Laurel. He won the six-furlong race by 8 ½ lengths and earned a 93 Beyer figure.

“It's always nice to have the half-brother to a really good horse,” Trombetta said. “I've been at this long enough to know some of them are good and some of them are not. But to see this horse put it together in the afternoon was what I was waiting for. I don't remember having a horse running a 93 Beyer number as easily as he did. Usually, they are put to a drive and asked to extend themselves. He was doing that rather comfortably. So that was exciting to see. I was expecting a good race based on the way the horse was training. Did I think he would run like that? Honestly, no. It was very nice to see. I'm not surprised that he took a jump forward because he had been training very well. It was nice for him to put it all together.”

From the start, Lonesome Road was a project, which is the reason why he didn't debut until halfway through his 3-year-old year.

“He was late coming around,” Trombetta said. “He didn't put it together as quickly as some of my other horses. He was one of those horses that needed a little more time. I think being able to give him that time really made a big difference.”

While winning a maiden race in the dead of winter might not seem like such a big deal, all one has to do is dig a little deeper and they will see that Lonesome Road might just have a bright future.

He began his career at Colonial Downs in a July 16 maiden race on the grass and finished a lackluster seventh. Trombetta put him back on the grass for a Sept. 12 maiden at Colonial and was rewarded with a second-place finish. He stayed on the grass only because he couldn't find a maiden dirt race for the horse that would fill.

“This may be a conversation for another day, but I had to enter him four times before [the Dec. 26] race went,” the trainer said. “That is a huge issue nowadays. As a horse trainer, when you want to run and when you actually get into the starting gate…a lot of times it is a weeks and weeks difference. That is the reality of racing these days.”

Johnson passed away in February and his two daughters took over the day-to-day operations of the stable. They huddled with Trombetta and it was decided that they would give Lonesome Road some time and that they would geld him. Upon his return, he was a different horse.

“I had some conversations with the ownership and the recommendation was to geld him and kind of take a step back and freshen him up,” Trombetta said. “I knew that the turf season was over and that it might be a little easier to find dirt races to go for him. Maybe his being gelded helped him. Maybe it was the time off. Maybe it was the surface change. You can pick any one of the three. Maybe it was a combination of all three. It seemed to all come together for him.”

Trombetta understands that Lonesome Road is unlikely to achieve what Mindframe did and he is prepared to take his time with him. He said he will point for a first-level allowance race. He's not worried about what the distance of that race might be.

“Preferably, I can find one at seven-eighths or a mile and that would be perfect,” he said. “Usually those races, from what I see, they have a little better chance of going. I trained his mother [Walk of Stars]. She was better going farther. Obviously, Mindframe was a good solid two-turn horse with a lot of talent. I don't think this guy will have any limits when it comes to distance. He may not be a mile-and-a-quarter horse, but I think I can run him anywhere from three-quarters to a mile-and-a-sixteenth without a lot of worry.”

Johnson died on Feb. 4 at the age of 78 after a lengthy battle with cancer. Trombetta wishes he were still around to watch his horses compete, particularly Lonesome Road. Johnson's estate also owns Future Is Now (Great Notion), the winner of this year's GIII Caress Stakes at Saratoga.

“This year has been bittersweet,” Trombetta said. “We've done very well this year and it's just a shame that he wasn't here to see it.”

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