Bowman, Phelps Own Successful OTTB

Water Cube | Anita Motion photo

By

Michael Phelps was a high schooler the first time he ever visited a racetrack. Phelps's swim coach, Bob Bowman, pulled him out of school one afternoon and took him to Laurel Park.

“Michael put down a bet and hit an exacta and so he was hooked from that minute on,” Bowman recalled. “We didn't tell his mom,” Bowman added with a chuckle.

And so, years later, as the Olympic gold medals piled on, Phelps and Bowman began owning Thoroughbreds together. Last week, one of their horses named Water Cube (Rockport Harbor) successfully tested his footing for the first time in dressage and show jumping competition. Bowman and Phelps retain a small ownership percentage in Water Cube, a horse they've owned since the gray gelding raced with little success at tracks like Laurel Park and Pimlico this past year.

“He was running pretty well, but Water Cube was great at like getting third every time, which is not a bad thing, but we just felt that he wasn't showing the kind of improvement on the track that we'd like to see,” Bowman said.

Trained by Graham Motion when on the track, Water Cube is named after the Beijing Aquatic Center where Phelps won eight Olympic gold medals in 2008. But the horse did little on the track to back up his namesake. Water Cube was 1-for-8 lifetime at the end of his lackluster racing career, winning a mere maiden claiming race last February at Tampa Bay Downs. The 4-year-old retired from racing this past spring. Though Phelps and Bowman, along with Graham and Anita Motion, retained part ownership of Water Cube, the horse was handed over to another Olympian-equestrian, Phillip Dutton, who won a bronze medal for Team USA in eventing this past summer at the Rio Olympics.

“When Phillip Dutton looked at him, he liked his conformation and the way he moved, so we decided to give him a chance [as an eventing horse],” Bowman said.

Water Cube most recently won a novice-level horse trial event Sept. 11, competing in dressage and small jump courses at the 123-acre Bucks County Horse Park in Revere, Pennsylvania.

“One of the reasons Michael and I stayed involved with Water Cube is so that we can kind of help give a voice to the OTTB cause, because I think it's very important,” Bowman said.

Bowman first got involved in horse racing in the early 1990s, when he went to work for a famous swimming coach in California named Paul Bergen, who took out a Thoroughbred training license after semi-retiring from coaching swim.

“It was the best way to pick his brain about swimming,” said Bowman, who cleaned stalls and worked on the backside for Bergen.

Bowman subsequently helped Bergen build a Thoroughbred training facility in Napa Valley, California.

“I started buying horses, racing them, bred a few, made a lot of mistakes and tried to correct them; you know how it goes,” Bowman said.

Once the training farm was built, Bowman and Bergen–just a couple of guys from the swimming world–tried their hand at training horses.

“We, of course, had them swim, that was our thing,” Bowman said about training tactics with the Thoroughbreds at the facility.

A South Carolina native, Bowman moved back east again in the mid-90s-to Baltimore, Maryland, where he met 11-year-old Michael Phelps in 1996. Bowman began coaching Phelps in his youth at the North Baltimore Aquatic Club. Meanwhile, Bowman had bred a filly with Bergen named Soda Canyon in California and brought her with him to Baltimore, sending her to Maryland trainer Bill Boniface.

“Bill Boniface showed me how things were done with horses and I had a good relationship with [trainer] Ferris Allen as well,” Bowman said.

Allen trained Bowman Thoroughbreds' Vanderkaay, a bay colt by Malibu Moon, who in 2008 won the Dancing Count S. at Laurel Park under jockey Rosie Napravnik. The horse was named after gold-medal winning swimmer Peter Vanderkaay, whom Bowman coached at the University of Michigan, where he served as head coach for the men's swimming program from 2005-2008.

Even after all Bowman has accomplished as a swimming coach–he was the head coach of the United States Olympic swim team in Rio and witnessed Phelps catapult his gold medal count to 23–few things compare to winning a horse race.

“I can honestly say, there is nothing like when your horse wins,” Bowman said. “It doesn't matter what kind of race.”

Asked about how swimming and horse racing are comparable, Bowman chuckled. “I'm not sure that they're very similar.” Bowman added, “I think swimming is a lot more predictable than horse racing; you don't need that much racing luck if you're well prepared in swimming.”

Bowman said Phelps officially got the horse racing bug when they went to the Kentucky Derby in 2009.

“NBC took us to the Derby after Beijing,” Bowman said. “And Michael [Phelps] became very good friends with Bob Baffert and that came about because Michael, when we were at Michigan, was good friends with Bob's nephew, who was also at Michigan. We both met Bob, and hung out and spent the day with him, so that was obviously a really cool thing to do. I think that kind of got [Phelps'] attention. And then, after 2012, we thought it would be fun to own a couple of horses together, so that's when we hooked up with Graham Motion.”

It was through Twitter where Bowman met Graham Motion, who trains horses for Bowman and Phelps today.

“[Graham Motion] had followed me because, you know, we're both Baltimore guys and I followed him back because I knew he was a great trainer,” Bowman said. “Michael and I knew we wanted to buy some horses and I asked Graham if he would consider finding some horses for us. He said 'sure,' so we went up and met him and that's how it got started [with Motion].”

Bowman and Phelps named their racing operation Charm City Racing for their long-time hometown of Baltimore. Their silks bear the purple-and-black colors of the Baltimore Ravens.

But Bowman doesn't foresee Charm City Racing becoming a mighty Thoroughbred conglomerate anytime soon.

“I really don't, because we're not going to spend that kind of money,” Bowman noted with a hearty laugh. “We're doing it for the fun.”

In 2013, Bowman and Phelps purchased their first horse together-a $55,000 Rockport Harbor colt at the Fasig-Tipton Midlantic 2-year-olds in Training Sale. They named the horse By a Hundredth, the margin Phelps won the gold in the 100-meter butterfly at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. By a Hundredth is now retired, living out his life as a pleasure horse in North Carolina, according to Bowman.

“I always want to make sure that any of our horses find a good home or a safe place to be when they are done racing,” Bowman said.

Asked about what he would think if Water Cube made it to the 2020 Olympics in eventing with Phillip Dutton, Bowman, whose main responsibility these days is head coach of the men's swimming program at Arizona State University, finds he can only imagine.

“It would be crazy,” Bowman said. “[Water Cube] is a nice horse, he's got a great personality and you can tell, at least I think, that his body has changed so much since he started jumping, and it looks like he's a great fit for eventing. It's been fun to see him find something that he really seems he can do.”

Perhaps those early days taking Michael Phelps to the track might one day pay off in a big way for Coach Bob Bowman, the way it did at the pool.

Not a subscriber? Click here to sign up for the daily PDF or alerts.

Copy Article Link

X

Never miss another story from the TDN

Click Here to sign up for a free subscription.