Thomas Albertrani's guest appearances

Thomas Albertrani

Winning Ponies

Mike Maloney

Keith Jones

James Ross

Dave Johnson

Steve Anderson

Peter Lee

Gary Johnson

Steve Pierson

Chad Brown

Ryan Martin

James Scully

Barry Pearl

Eric Reed

Bob Roberts

Wendy Davis

OwlTail

Albertrani was born March 21, 1958 in Brooklyn, N.Y., and now resides in Garden City, N.Y. He first went to work walking hots and grooming horses for his uncle, trainer Jack Abatemarco. He started learning the basics with his uncle and eventually went on to become a jockey. The family moved from Brooklyn to Valley Stream when Albertrani was 10. In order to begin riding sooner before he grew too big, Albertrani took part in an accelerated program at Valley Stream High School on Long Island and completed his course work early in 1976. Broke in as an apprentice in New York and New Jersey at the age of 19, but was still busy in the morning working as an exercise rider. “I was kind of doing both. I was galloping horses and picking up a mount here and there. Then he began working for trainer Mark Casse, first as an exercise rider/jockey and then as assistant trainer. He was introduced to trainer Bill Mott through Casse and had the opportunity to gallop top fillies Heatherten and Sefa's Beauty . He stayed in New York to work for Mott when Casse decided to relocate to Kentucky. He then spent nine years as Mott’s top New York assistant. During that time, Mott developed champions Theatrical and Paradise Creek and Cigar emerged as a superstar. Among the other trainers Albertrani worked for were Howie Tesher and Norman Casse, and Hall of Famers P.G. Johnson, Jack Van Berg and LeRoy Jolley. In 1995, he was hired by Godolphin Racing and moved his family to Dubai, where he was a top assistant with the main Godolphin string of trainer Saeed bin Suroor. Albertrani had been introduced to members of Sheikh Mohammed’s Godolphin operation because Mott handled a few of their horses. Albertrani and his family moved to Dubai two days after Cigar won the 1995 Breeders’ Cup Classic at Belmont Park. In 2003, Albertrani began training in New York full-time with 10 horses for Darley, all owned by members of the Maktoum royal family of Dubai, and in Oct. 2005, he opened a public stable for the first time with the permission of Darley to take on some outside clients.

'Winning Ponies' welcomes King Congie's trainer Thomas Albertrani