OPELOUSAS — Sam Breaux quietly, almost silently, observes from inside the horse stall.

The evening sun has begun to set on Evangeline Downs, which casts a slight sliver of shade across the paddock area at the race track. On this particular May night, the 64-year-old trainer has four horses running on the card that features nine races. The first of his horses that will trot out to the starting gates is Star Anne.

The thoroughbred very much looks the part of a winning horse, but isn’t exactly acting like one. It appears nervous and while walking around the paddock area routinely pulls the reins out from the hands of the handler. Breaux has seen this scene play out thousands of times before. He walks out of the stall and gently grabs the reins of the horse. 

Breaux gives the horse a look and after a brief pause, he begins to lead the horse around the paddock. The two make two laps and the horse, who just a short time earlier was displaying nerves, is seemingly at ease. Breaux hands the reins to one of his hands, and the jockey mounts the horse — a thoroughbred that will come in second place.

“I was told one time that 20 percent of the jockeys are going to win 80 percent of the races,” Breaux said. “And 20 percent of the trainers are going to win 80 percent of the races. You always want to be in that 20 percent.”

Formative years

Breaux has been around horses his entire life.

His father Ferdinand had horses on his sugar cane farm in Loreauville, while his grandfather George Viator had horses, and race horses, on his dairy farm outside of New Iberia. Breaux would “ride in horse shows and different things like that” and experienced horse racing life by tagging along to watch his grandfather’s horses run at Evangeline Downs, the Fair Grounds in New Orleans and the old Jefferson Downs in Kenner.

“I always liked to fool with the horses,” Breaux said. “I would go and watch my grandfather’s trainers and see what they did and how they worked the horses.”

Breaux may have loved horses, but he believed his future would be cultivating crops, not championship race horses. Breaux graduated from Loreauville High in 1972 and went on to get his bachelor’s degree in agriculture from LSU in 1977. 

Even though his focus might have been on agriculture, Breaux did take a few courses that proved to be beneficial, including courses on horseshoeing, and horse reproduction.

“We dissected horse legs and everything else,” Breaux said. “We learned about all the structures in the horse’s leg than just there is a leg right there. We learn about all the tendons and ligaments, the bone and how it all associated with one another. A horse has a really fine leg to carry that much weight.”

Breaux couldn’t find a suitable job after graduation so he took a job as a material coordinator at Texaco. But fate would intervene.

“One day this guy asked me if I had ever trained a race horse before,” said Breaux, who got his trainer’s license in 1980. “I said no, but I told him that I could probably do it. So I started training one or two quarter horses and those one or two quarter horses grew into no more quarter horses and about 14 or 15 thoroughbreds.”

At first, Breaux’s career as a horse trainer was a secondary job. Every day he would get off work at around 4 o’clock and then come home and train horses for hours. The next morning he would get up early to train the horses for a few hours before going to work.

“You got to care for your animals every day,” Breaux said. “You have to keep that in mind. That’s what I learned growing up on the farm. If you cheat those animals then they will cheat you. You have to take care of them.”

“Sam has won races from the bush tracks to the stakes level, and he has won on every level along the way,” said Dr. James “Sonny” Corley of Acadiana Equine Hospital who has worked with Breaux for 35 years. “He always take good care of his horses. I unfortunately see a lot of people who are getting horses these days and then are just throwing them away by not taking care of them or just abandoning them. Sam is not that way. He truly cares about his horses.”

In 1990, Breaux was laid off from his job at Texaco. He landed on his feet by getting a sales job at Iberia Rental, but that job proved to be only temporary, as soon his passion for training horses would become a full-time gig.

A steady hand

The entrance to the 85-acre farm on the outskirts of New Iberia is as humble as the man who owns and runs the property.

There is no large or ornate signage proclaiming that you are entering the horse farm of a man responsible for training horses that have earned more than $30 million in purse winnings. 

The driveway is dirt and rock and the only type of trophy one will find is a faded stone jockey statue standing next to a building. The office inside is filled with equipment and paperwork; one might not even know it is the office of a race horse trainer if not for a few famed photos of half million race winners.

Inside the massive metal building are the stables that house more than half of the farm’s 53 horses — another 36 are staying at the race track. There is a buzz of activity in the summer afternoon air as a few farm hands are bathing and brushing horses, a few more taking horses for some exercise and then a few more filling up feed bags. 

This where you will find Breaux, as he walks from stall to stall and inspects each horse. 

“He is the hardest working trainer I know or have known,” said Ricky LaGrange, who has known Breaux since 1985 and currently has five horses trained by him. “He is a hands-on trainer. He is not one of those trainers that have assistants do all the work. He feels every bone and joint on the horse. He is not one of the showboats out there. Sam is genuine.”

“He is a very special guy to work with because of his intelligence,” Corley said. “I enjoy working with people who understand the technical level of what we do as veterinarian. I talk to him like another veterinarian. At the same time, he’s not overbearing and he is extremely humble.”

Experience & wisdom

As he goes from horse to horse, Breaux reveals some of the lessons he has learned over his nearly four-decade career.

“Training a race horse is a very long process,” Breaux said. “You have to teach them how to ride, teach them how to gallop, teach them how to gallop with company and learn how to be competitive with another horse. You have to teach them how to get into a starting gate and not try to back out. It is a tedious process.”

Breaux laughs and admits that sometimes patience has to be taught to the horse owners.

“I had one owner he didn’t understand that the horse had to learn to race,” Breaux said. “They know how to run but they don’t know which direction to go. It is like a kid playing t-ball. Those kids hit the ball and then you have to tell them ‘no don’t run that way, run this way.’ That is more less the same with a race horse.”

A few other lessons from Breaux:

— On finding the right jockey, “Some riders just can’t get along with a certain horse. Some riders will fit every horse. That they have that knack in them. That’s why they are the better riders.”

— On what build a horse needs to race, “A good horse usually has a good confirmation. A horse that is crooked and not made correctly isn’t going to last long. Just like a tire on your car, if it is out of line then it is going to wear out quick.”

— On horses that fight you, “Horses that are always fighting you to do simple little things, they aren’t going to last. They going to beat themselves before they even get into the race because they make things so difficult.”

Breaux also states that not every race horse is the same. Every one of the thousands of horses he has trained are different in some way.

“You got to figure out what makes a horse tick,” Breaux said. “Not all of them are the same. Every horse is different. It is just like any athlete some of can sprint right off the bat and others have to run three miles before they can even compete.”

Sometimes the horse just needs a steady hand, which usually is Breaux’s.

“I had this crazy filly named Quick Count,” LaGrange said. “You couldn’t saddle her up in the stall before the race. The only person that could was Sam. He would walk her around and calm her down, which allowed the groomers to grab the reigns and he would saddle her. Once they would put the jockey on the saddle she was alright. Until that moment though she was a crazy horse, but she was a good horse.”

Winning with grace

Breaux has a reputation of being one of the best and respected trainers in all of Acadiana. He has trained a pair of half-million purse winners in Nitro Chip (who was also named the Louisiana Thoroughbred Breeders Association 3-year-old male in 2005), and Fuse It which won 11 races.

Just don’t ask Breaux how many times he has visited the winner’s circle – he doesn’t know, and doesn’t keep track. 

The website equibase.com thankfully does. Heading into Saturday’s thoroughbred season finale at Evangeline Downs, Breaux had 11,368 starts, with a win, place or show 4,784 times, including 1,741 trips to the winner’s circle.

Breaux’s humility is something that has endeared him to those he has worked for and worked with over the decades.

“We joke around that we have spent more time with each other than we have with our families over the years,” Corley said. “Being a horse trainer is kind of like having the NFL but it is 24-7, 365 days a year. We’re always running from Vinton to Lafayette to New Iberia or to New Orleans. It is a non-stop profession. Sam finds a way to have a three-ring circus running with two rings.”

“Plenty of people will file objections at the end of the race,” LaGrange said. “Sam is like ‘that is the way it is’. He is true a horse gentlemen.”

It is middle of August and the thoroughbred season is nearing its end at Evangeline Downs, and there is Breaux standing and watching as one of his horses, this one named Ardesia, wins the fourth race of the night — a one-mile run on the dirt track.

Breaux waits as the jockey rides the horse into the winners circle and he stands next to yet another winner for a photo.

So how much longer will he keep this up?

“A vacation for me is going to a horse sale,” Breaux said. 

Asked what he loves about training horses, Breaux simply states, “I don’t have any particular reason, but I just love it.”

Then, after a brief pause, he laughs.

“I do like to win.”