Dublin-born trainer Leo O’Brien had his greatest year ever in 1990 when Yanks Music, the filly owned by fellow Irishman Michael Fennessy, won the Eclipse Award as the nation’s top three-year-old filly. The Eclipse is the highest honor bestowed in American racing, and with seven wins from nine career starts, and a bankroll of nearly $800,000, Yanks Music was a unanimous choice.

It was a deserved honor for O’Brien, whose legendary patience and skill with horses finally paid off with a champion. Regretfully, Yanks Music was injured in training for the Breeders’ Cup Classic and has since been retired.

“Being from a large family and finishing school at 14, one has to go out and look for a job,” says Leo O’Brien of his initial involvement with horse racing.

A native of Newcastle, Co. Kildare, O’Brien, one of 11 children, not only found himself a job in those early days, he’s also built an enormously successful career as one of New York’s leading horse conditioners. O’Brien’s list of achievements since coming to the U.S. in 1964 is a long and impressive one. He’s saddled four horses who have won at least $1 million in purses. One of his standouts, Fourstars Allstar crossed the Atlantic in 1991 to win the prestigious Irish 2,000 guineas and in 1993 ran third in the Breeder’s Cup Mile. The venerable Fourstardave earned his nickname the Sultan of Saratoga for amassing a seven-consecutive-year win streak at the storied upstate New York course. New York-bred fillies Irish Actress and Irish Linnet have also done O’Brien proud, winning important graded stakes races before retiring last year.

O’Brien came to the U.S. to ride for Raymond Guest, who at the time was U.S. Ambassador to Ireland. He continued his career as a jockey until 1976, when a spill at Monmouth Park in New Jersey prompted him to have second thoughts. A year later he returned to Ireland to train horses at the Curragh with his brother Michael — in 1979 the O’Brien brothers were named the top steeplechase trainers in Ireland — and in 1981 he returned to the U.S. to assume a full-time training career.

It’s been success after success for O’Brien ever since, and his star shines bright at Saratoga every August. He was the second leading trainer at Saratoga in 1993, and fifth in 1994. At present he conditions over 40 horses at his base in Belmont Park.

O’Brien and his wife, Joan, have two children, both of whom are involved in horse racing.