With more than 9,000 career driving wins, a number that places him 28th all-time in North American harness racing history, PEI-native Paul MacKenzie has probably accomplished more than he ever thought he would when he ventured to Ontario more than 35 years ago. A lot of things have changed since the day that he and two friends left PEI looking for more, but one thing that hasn’t is Paul’s work ethic. Up early and off to work, almost daily since he was just 11 or 12-years-old, the man who sits second for number of all-time wins on Canadian soil has worked hard for everything he’s achieved, and it’s a list of accomplishments that seriously warrants him consideration for a possible nomination to the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame. By Dan Fisher.
When Paul MacKenzie was just six-years-old and his grandfather, Walter Ferguson, started taking him to the Charlottetown Driving Park while he was paddocking horses for his brother Elmer, he couldn’t possibly have known that one day his grandson would become one of Standardbred racing’s winningest drivers. But both Walter, and Paul’s dad, Gordon, were hard workers, and it was a trait that they passed along to Paul as well. Now, some 55 years later, after many years of hard work, the man they call ‘Lou’ has an astounding 9,014 career driving victories, and he’s won more races on Canadian soil (8,999) than any other driver but one.
“My dad wasn’t really into the horses,” Paul MacKenzie explains on a rare afternoon where he isn’t hurrying from his barn to his truck to get to London or Flamboro to drive a line-up of horses on that evening’s racing card. “He would come and watch me drive once I got going, but it was my grandfather, Walter Ferguson, who introduced me to it. My mother was Myrna Ferguson before she married my dad and my grandfather used to go help his brother Elmer race. We lived right across the street from the track [Charlottetown] so he’d bring me with him,” MacKenzie reminisces fondly.
“By the time I was about 12-years-old I started working in the backstretch for Earl Smith. Buddy Campbell was another guy that I remember learning a bit from too - he was a guy that could hang up a horse pretty good and teach you a little. But I started working for Earl, even during the school year. When I was in high school I’d get up by six every day, go in and clean 10 or 11 stalls, come home and shower and get to school. I’d come back at night to do paddocks too - you’d get paid a whole five bucks. You’d get yourself an order of fries with some of the money and then after the race you’d have to get the horse and all the gear back to the barn and get him put away. They were long days but it was a lot of fun.
“Then I’d work for him on the weekends, and the days off, and all summer of course. They let me start jogging them when I was about 12 I think, and I was going training miles when I was 13 or so. They wanted you to hit your training times though and I learned pretty quick that if I was off by a few seconds to reset the watch and stop it again, at the right time, on my way back to the barn,” Paul laughs. “You wanted me to go in [2]:30? Look at my watch, there, I went in :30.
“When I was 14, Garry MacDonald had an old mare named Gale McGee, and he’d let me warm her up. I’d get to put on the pant-clips and the gloves and everything… I thought I was pretty special then,” he smiles.
“There were lots of us learning the ropes around there back then, guys like Harry Poulton and Wally Hennessey and Jimmy and Walter Whelan. When I was 16 and I was able to finally get my license I went to get it with Harold Shepherd - that’s Robert and Patrick Shepherd’s dad. The Maritimes were still under the USTA then and we had to go to Summerside to write the test… it was just one test then for both your trainer’s and driver’s license. Anyway, we go over there and meet up with Ron MacArthur, he was the USTA rep and he knew us. So Harold had the rule book with him because we had been studying. We knew all of the bits and the bridles and stuff but the rules were a bit harder. So Ron takes us to this room and I said to Harold, ‘You might wanna bring that book in with us… you know, just in case,’” MacKenzie laughs at the memory. “Well we got to a couple of the rules questions that we probably knew anyway, but we checked in the book - just to be sure - and we passed with flying colours.
“Back then you didn’t need to drive in qualifiers first to get your full license, you could drive right in a pari-mutuel race. My first drive was on an old horse named Guy Norris, he was trained by Mickey Dunn, but he wasn’t my first winner. Someone had sent Earl Smith a horse named Jonesy - he had two bowed tendons and was pretty lame. Earl told me if I swam him in the river every day he’d let me drive him in the race. So everyday I’d take him down to the Hillsborough River in Charlottetown. I’d put on a life-jacket and I’d put a blind bridle on him and run a set of lines back behind his tail so I could hold on. I’d run him into the river and get him going and I’d make him swim about a mile out before I’d turn him to head back in. As we’d be getting closer to the land on our way back he’d be getting tired, so when he’d see the land he’d get pumping harder and harder to try and get there. As soon as he hit land his legs would be moving so fast I’d have to be careful to get him snatched up before he got away on me,” laughs Paul.
“So race day came and he had sounded up pretty good from just swimming in the river everyday. I put him right on the gate and sent him outta there. I remember being on top by quite a bit and looking over my shoulder going to the last turn… nobody was coming so I just popped the wheel disc and we were gone. It was my first win and it’s something I’ll never forget,” says the man who has made a career out of doing just that - winning - ever since.
Today Paul MacKenzie sits 28th all-time, for wins by drivers in North America, but he’s more than just a driver - he’s a trainer and an all-around horseman too. Of the 27 men ahead of him on that all-time wins list, only three of them have more training wins than his 972.
“In the early ‘80s Earl [Smith] and Ronnie Gass took a bunch of their better horses to try them in Montreal for a while, so Earl sent me to set up a stable in Halifax at Sackville Downs. I did well there and I started meeting more people and getting more drives. I hooked up with a fella there by the name of John Proude too, and he played a very important role in my development as a driver. John and I won a lot of races together at Sackville Downs over the years. My time there provided me with a lot of good experience and by the mid-80s I had won over 100 races a year for a few years in a row. I figured that there wasn’t a lot left for me to do down home so it was probably time to try it in Ontario for a while.
“There was a vet I knew by the name of Dr. Irwin Hallett, and he said that he knew a vet in Ontario that needed some help breaking his babies, training his horses and running his farm - it was near Peterborough and it was called Rob Ron Acres. So Paul Dunn (Mickey’s son), Vaughan Doyle and I decided to head to Ontario and look into it. It was in the winter and we stopped in Montreal to stay with our friends at the track there for a week or so - jeez it was cold there,” Paul remembers.
“So we get to Ontario and we find this farm, and I’m telling you, it’s in the middle of nowhere. And it was cold as hell there too. He shows us around the place… he shows us this house-trailer that we’re going to live in and stuff, and I’m saying ‘Boys, I don’t know if I like this. I wouldn’t mind being a little closer to something more than this’ (laughing). He invited us inside for dinner and was telling us how much the pay was going to be, and I told him that I had to make a call down to some friends at Flamboro first before agreeing to anything. So I called John Holmes and he said that there were jobs for all three of us at Flamboro. So we told the fella, ‘Sorry’ and I went to work for John, Paul got a job with Walter Whelan and Vaughan went to Mike Grabarczyk. I was just happy that we didn’t get stuck up there in the middle of nothing,” Mackenzie recalls with a chuckle.
“Flamboro was a great place to be back then. A guy could get a little homesick but there were a lot of Maritime guys around Flamboro and so there was always someone around who you knew from back home. Jay Cochlin gave me my first drive there, on a horse named Iron Bridges, and he was my first win there too. I also got some drives early on from a guy named Doug Pickard, and Holmesy gave me the odd drive as well.
“After I was here for about a year and got settled, my wife Kathy moved here too. Her name is Kathy but everyone calls her Sue. I had gotten us a little apartment in Hamilton… it wasn’t in the greatest shape though and I really needed her help cleaning it up and painting it,” Paul recalls.
“Eventually I went to work over at the Jockey Club for a while, for Frank Conlin. I remember that John Cecchin and Jack Belliveau were both working there then. Not long after I started, Con was coming down off of a big drunk and said we were taking some horses to Brandywine… so I went down there for a while with Frank and Belliveau - that was quite the time (laughing).
“I didn’t stay with Conlin long though because I really wanted to work for somebody who would let me drive the horses in races. I came back over to Flamboro and eventually a fella named Taxi MacDonald set me up with a guy named Frank Burns, and that turned out to be a big thing for me. Taxi was really just a gambler… he rode for the Whelans in the mornings and sold cigarettes and booze and stuff the rest of the day, so he knew everyone. Frank was an owner and trainer but he ran an air-conditioning business or something as well, so he didn’t have a lot of extra time. I got set up with him and he let me drive the whole stable. And he then introduced me to Anthony Nichols from Peterborough, and he gave me some horses to train as well.
“I got doing pretty good with the driving and started getting a lot of catch-drives, and it went from there. That would’ve been in the early 90s, and then Bill Megens introduced me to John Christensen and Ralph Lake too, and they became really good owners for me as well.
“Another great owner that’s been with me for years is Ed James of SSG Gloves. He’s been really good to me. I remember that he had horses out west with Rod Hennessy, and he just called me up one day and told me he wanted me to drive one out west for him, in one of those big races out there. I said ‘Are you sure?’ or something like that and he said ‘Yup, there will be a plane ticket waiting for you and a new pair of gloves and glasses... it’s all set up’. So I went out and drove the horse and we’ve been connected ever since.
“I won the [$175,000] Western Canadian Pacing Derby for him with Hyperion Hanover in 2006 at Northlands - it was one of my biggest wins ever. Then later that summer I went back out to Stampede Park and won a heat of the Nat Christie with him too. In the second heat, later that day, we got into a bit of a battle with Piercy though [Ron Pierce] and finished back.
“Ed lets me train them how I want. He never interferes and has been a great owner. I have a homebred two-year-old My MVP filly for him right now… I like her, I think she’s going to be alright.”
Maybe the trotting filly in question will prove to be one that makes it worth getting out of bed in the morning. Doing just that is definitely a well known part of this business - the late nights and early mornings. But many of the other top drivers, people that have far fewer wins and earnings than MacKenzie, don’t necessarily get up at the crack of dawn every morning after driving on a late-night race card.
“I’ve never minded working,” relates Paul. “My dad was a barber and I was shining people’s shoes in his barber shop when I was about eight-years-old. It was really good work around Christmas too, because people would tip better. And I’ve always liked breaking babies and training a few horses. I’ve still got seven horses at Emerald Isle and I don’t mind getting up in the morning and going to work. I guess I’ve been doing it for a long time now,” says the 61-year-old who has been up early and heading to work almost every day since he was only 11 or 12-years-old.
“When I first started doing well here [in Ontario] the drivers’ colony on the [Ontario] Jockey Club wasn’t an easy one to break into. All of the big stables had their main guys, and guys like Brownie and Condren and Paul MacDonell were all still pretty young and weren’t about to be going anywhere. I have no complaints,” states MacKenzie. “The afternoon posts they had at Flamboro allowed me to do double-duty [drive at two tracks per day] and between that and when the slots came in you were still able to make a pretty good living even if you weren’t driving at Mohawk and Woodbine all of the time. I’ve had a lot of great moments.”
The biggest of those moments, albeit not for the most reward, just may have been when the native Islander returned home in 1993 to win the famed Gold Cup & Saucer with a pacing mare no-less, that he had never even sat behind prior to their trip out east.
“Winning the Gold Cup & Saucer with Little Black Book is still probably the biggest highlight of my career,” Paul beams. “When I was a kid we’d be hanging off of the lamp posts and the roof of the grandstand just to be able to see that race once a year. Post time would be at midnight and the whole town was there, so to go back and actually win it was a pretty big thrill.
“I had trained some horses for the Millars over the years because I had a pretty good relationship with Joe Stutzman, and when he had some that couldn’t do on the Jockey Club he’d often send them to me over at Flamboro. A few of them belonged to the Millars and one year I told them that I’d be gone for a week as I’d be heading home for the Gold Cup & Saucer. George Jr. had never heard of it and asked me for details. I told him about the week, the fans, the parade, the golf courses, and about the big race itself. Then he asked me if a horse like Little Black Book would be good enough for it. Well she was an Open Class mare at Greenwood at the time so I said that taking a horse like her would be fantastic. He told me that Joe probably wouldn’t be too happy but that I could tell him I was going to be bringing her to PEI (laughing).
“We shipped her out and kept her at Doc Moore’s farm. I trained her at the track a little trip on the Friday I think and then she raced in the last Trial on the Monday night. She could dance right off the screen if you asked her to leave and she went out and set a Track and Canadian Record of 1:54 in the Trial. The whole island was buzzing about her and George Sr. and his wife really enjoyed it because they came down for the week and everywhere they went people were talking about their mare.
“We went back for the final and when they said ‘Go’ I was on front like now. We won by lots in [1]:54.1. That was quite the experience. I got to keep training and driving her for about a year after that too… when we got back I took her to Mohawk and we almost beat Shady Daisy at big odds. [Ron] Pierce just nipped us in the last step,” shares the man who has obviously tasted success at more places than just Flamboro Downs.
“My fastest win ever came with Bolero Charles for Steve Charlton and Tommy Larocque. I won the Open Pace with him at Mohawk in 1:49.4 and beat Shadow Play that night.”
In fact, if one looks at the chart from that Bolero Charles victory in 2009, and reads between the lines a little, they’ll see the name Paul MacKenzie written all over that Open Pace. Not only did he drive the winner, but the third-place finisher in that race was the aforementioned Hyperion Hanover, the same horse MacKenzie steered to victory in the Western Canadian Pacing Derby a few years earlier. And the fifth-place finisher that night was Silent Swing - a horse Paul drove to victory in a Gold Cup & Saucer Trial in 2006, only to finish a close second a week later in the final.
Paul MacKenzie may be the undisputed king in the history of Flamboro Downs, but please don’t think that the Dundas, Ontario oval is the only place that he’s made his mark professionally.
As far as a personal life goes however, the life of a busy trainer and driver in the Standardbred industry always seems to take its toll, and in Paul’s case it’s admittedly no different.
“My wife really deserves a big shout-out and a huge thank you,” MacKenzie sincerely acknowledges. “She did such a great job with my girls, Hillary [29] and Taylor [25], because I was on the road a lot and wasn’t home helping them. I had to be out making money so we could have a good life, but that didn’t make it any easier on her over the years.
“Kathy and I originally met at Summerside Racetrack because her dad, Lloyde, and her brother, Ed, had a horse named J C L D. He was their only horse though - he was more like a family pet. I think he practically lived in their backyard,” he laughs. “They actually put me down to drive him after her and I started dating, and I even won with him one night at Charlottetown… I think that put me in their good books for a while at least.
“My wife and girls weren’t really into the horses a lot though, but Sue would still bring the girls to the track sometimes to watch me drive. Her and Callie Rankin’s wife, Brenda, were good friends, so my girls became close with Callie’s girls too. Now Taylor is living down east and Hillary is still in this area. They’re both doing great and have their mom to thank for that in a big way.”
When asked, Paul’s daughter Taylor is happy to share her thoughts on her dad.
“I can honestly say that my dad is one of the hardest working people that I have ever met. He’s like his dad in that way, he just doesn’t stop and he will help anyone who needs it along the way. I will always look up to him for that and I’m very proud of him and all of his accomplishments. It’s very well deserved for all of the hard work and time that he’s put in over the years.”
Taylor is right. Her dad’s accomplishments are many and they’ve been earned the tough way… he’s worked hard for everything he’s achieved. Only Sylvain Filion has more wins on Canadian soil and an argument could easily be made that it’s even a career worthy of a hall of fame induction.
MacKenzie laughs at the notion because his current barn help seems to already have a strong opinion on who should be in the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame.
“Phil Coleman [Casie’s dad] helps me get the driving done these days,” Paul shares. “When that topic came up he told me that he’s going to get me in next year because he’s got to get Casie in there first. I told him that I think you have to be 55 [years old] or something before you’re eligible, and he told me that’s dumb and that he needs to get her in while some of her older owners are still with us. I told him that she’s going to get in for sure one day anyway, and they’re not just going to change the rules just for him. I don’t know if you know Phil,” Paul laughs, “but he’s quite the character.”
What about retiring one day? Will Paul MacKenzie ever slow down?
“Not right now,” he states. “I like my job and my health seems pretty good, so I think I’ll just keep on going. One day I’d like to move back home to PEI though. Maybe when I do that I’ll just head down to Florida each winter and drive colts for someone down there… then spend my summers out east. This business is a tough go… I guess it would be nice to slow down and enjoy things a bit more one day.”
When asked point blank, the following question, this is how the affable Paul MacKenzie replies…
Q. When you were back at Rob Ron Acres on that cold winter day all those years ago, what do you think the 25-year-old Paul would have said if he was told that one day he’d be one of the sport’s all-time winningest drivers and that he’d be worthy of a hall of fame discussion?
Paul: “I’d have said ‘I got a long ways to go and I sure hope it warms the F@#K up!’”
This feature originally appeared in the June issue of TROT Magazine. Subscribe to TROT today by clicking the banner below.
