For Trainer Chris Kolb, A Kinder, Gentler Approach

For Trainer Chris Kolb, A Kinder, Gentler Approach

By Vicky Moon

Let’s start with the most important part of Thoroughbred trainer Chris Kolb: He approaches his work with a philosophy very rare in this world of fractious, often excited and sometimes erratic race horses.

It’s a studied system he uses with the sleek young horses he breaks along with veteran local rider Harris Tracy. They deal with three types of temperaments. The first group are the horses that arrive at Kolb’s barn that have come from the horse sales/auctions.

“They’ve been handled quite a bit and on the whole they’re easy to deal with,” he said.

Chris Kolb

Photo by Doug Gehlsen Middleburg Photo

The second group are horses that have come off a farm and only been around one or two people. He makes sure these horses only deal with one or two people when they come for training at his barn. “That way it’s not shocking to the horse,” he added.

Finally, there are some horses that are unhandled. “They’re scared to death,” Kolb said. “Horses are flight animals and this type are scared of anything.” The answer here is to proceed slowly. “It does not work to strong arm them.”

Kolb steps in one of the stalls in barn seven at the Middleburg Training Center to watch and think as the breaking process begins, again an exceptional trait in this profession. Too often at this stage there is yanking on a chain shank or similar impatience displayed. Not by this quiet, contemplative man, who arrived in Virginia in 1971 to take a job with legendary horseman J. Arthur Reynolds at the age of 19.

While growing up on the north side of Chicago, his mother took him at age 12 for riding lessons at Coach House Stables. He immediately loved it. Later, during his teenage years, a friend told him about a possible job with Reynolds and he went to Warrenton to meet him.

“He had a little bit of everything,” Kolb said, explaining that there were race horses, show horses and fox hunting horses in the Reynolds stables.

Not long after that, Kolb was drafted into the Army. It turned out to be a fortuitous experience when he joined the pentathlon division with Col. John Russell in San Antonio.

Many other well-known local horsemen have also worked with Russell, including Olympic equestrian Jimmy Wofford, who defined Russell as an intuitive coach, not a technical coach. Gould Brittle and Jimmy Jack as well as the late show jumping rider Michael Hunter from Pennsylvania are also Russell alumni.

Kolb returned to Reynolds stables in Virginia for few more years and in 1980, he took at job with Lewis Wiley, a trainer in The Plains.

He first worked out of a barn near Wiley’s Gordonsdale Farm at a crossroads known as Belvoir. He helped with the breaking and training and eventually went with Wiley to the Middleburg Training Center in barn eight. Kolb soaked up all the details and nuances of training with all types from claiming horses to allowance and some stakes too. His favorite was stakes winner Best Endorsement.

Wiley, now in his early 80s, has since retired and said, “He’s a good man and does a good job with horses. I gave him all my tack. It just wasn’t fun anymore.” Kolb and his wife, Nancy, struck out on their own with Kolb Racing Stables. “I find it very enjoyable,” he said.