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Mike Maker
Trainer Bios

Mike Maker

Born: Feb. 7, 1969, in Garden City, Michigan

Record at Keeneland

Total Wins: 244
Stakes Wins: 16

Career Firsts

First Grade 1 Win: 2009 Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile at Oak Tree at Santa Anita with Furthest Land
First Stakes Win: 2004 Labor Day Handicap at Mountaineer Park with Freefourinternet
First Graded Stakes Win: 2004 Hawthorne Gold Cup (G2) at Hawthorne with Freefourinternet
First Career Win: April 28, 1993, at Detroit Race Course with Rauros

Starters in the Toyota Blue Grass Stakes


Year

Horse

Finish

2019

Somelikeithotbrown

4th

2018

California Night

10th

2016

Twizz

14th

2015

Pepper Roani

8th

2014

Harry’s Holiday

13th

2013

Fear the Kitten

5th

2012

Hansen

2nd

2012

Gung Ho

3rd

2011

Twinspired

2nd

2011

Joes Blazing Aaron

6th

2010

Stately Victor

Won

2007

Love Dubai

7th

 

At Keeneland


Six leading trainer titles: 2008 Spring, 2013 Spring and Fall, 2016 Spring, 2017 Fall, 2019 Fall.

Holds the Spring Meet record of 25 wins set in April 2013.

First Keeneland win came during the 2004 Spring Meet.

Grade 1 wins are the 2010 Toyota Blue Grass with 40-1 longshot Stately Victor, the 2012 Breeders’ Futurity with Joha and the 2013 Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup with Kitten's Dumplings.

Won the 2020 TVG Elkhorn (G2) with Zulu Alpha and the Kentucky Utilities Transylvania (G3) with Field Pass on closing day of the five-day Summer Meet.

Career


Breeders’ Cup wins (3): 2009 Dirt Mile with Furthest Land; 2011 Juvenile with Hansen; 2020 Juvenile Turf with Fire At Will.

North American career earnings exceeding $160 million with 3,272 wins through Nov. 28, 2023.

3,000th win came Aug. 5, 2002, when Palatial Times won the fifth race at Ellis Park.

Recorded 2,000th win on Nov. 30, 2017, when Tomahawk Kitten won the first race at Turfway Park.

Posted career win 1,000 on March 16, 2013, at Fair Grounds with Magical Season.

Trained 2011 champion 2-year-old male Hansen.

Click here for his Equibase career record.

 

Background


Mike became involved in racing because his father, the late George Maker, was a trainer in Michigan. Mike cleaned stalls and walked hots, and he exercised horses when he became a teenager.

After training on his own in Michigan, Maker went to work for D. Wayne Lukas’ Midwest division at Churchill Downs and Lukas assistant Dallas Stewart. He started as an exercise rider then became barn foreman and an assistant trainer. When Stewart departed in 1997, Mike replaced him. He was ready to go back out on his own in 2003. He is a leading trainer throughout Kentucky.