It is not uncommon to stumble upon stakes winners and hard-knocking earners in low claiming races these days. Thoroughbreds can slip through the cracks. Some can continue to race for years, picking up cheques for any number of owners and trainers. And some might never get to enjoy a life of retirement as a young person’s riding horse or someone’s companion animal.

Marc Detampel only owned CAZADERO for four races in his 26-race career, so the racing fan who sent him an email recently about the horse now racing for $4,000 claiming was a bit sheepish bringing it to his attention.

But Detampel, president of the US division of the human resource consulting company Felix Global in Chicago, welcomed the information. Cazadero had won the Grade 2 Nearctic Stakes at Woodbine and almost $110,000 from the purse in the fall of 2022 for Detampel and trainer Brendan Walsh. He wanted to give the seven-year-old son of Street Sense a life away from the track.

In a matter of days, Detampel and his friends Fergus Galvin (owner of Hunter Valley Farm) and Barry Clohessy, co-owners of the gelding those few races, set up to claim the gelding from the five-furlong dash on Jan. 31. It would be the horse’s first race since November when he was a well-beaten sixth for the same claiming price.

“I don’t want to see any of my horses racing at that class level,” said Detampel, who has been in racing and breeding for 15 years and was a co-owner of champion and Breeders’ Cup winner Caravel. “Brendan and his team were at Fair Grounds and they were a big help. Fergus was there and Barry was ready to bed the horse down on his farm in Kentucky.”

Cazadero trailed throughout the race and beat just one rival, but the claim slip had been dropped and the gelding was soon whisked off to Walsh’s Fair Grounds barn to start his retirement.

“That was the first race I ever watched at Delta Downs,” said Detampel. “I was just screaming at the TV for him to pull up, hopefully not get hurt. He’s a little banged up and he should have never been racing on that track,” said Detampel. “We’re going to take him to Kentucky, check him out and let him be a horse. Maybe one day he can be a riding horse for someone.”

Sallee Van Company offered to deliver Cazadero to Clohessy’s Kentucky farm free of charge.

Cazadero was bred and raced by Barbara Banke’s Stonestreet Thoroughbred Holdings. The horse was trained by Steve Asmussen when he won the Bashford Manor stakes the second time out in his career. But after eight races for Asmussen, the horse was sold at the 2022 Keeneland April Horses of Racing Age Sale and picked up by Detampel et al for $50,000. They later sold him at the same sale the following year and Sean Perl Bloodstock purchased him for $60,000.

Cazadero then raced for David Jacobson for 13 races, spiraling down from $80,000 claiming to $12,500 when he finally won again, a turf sprint at Louisiana Downs last fall. Workman Ranch claimed the horse for $4,000 from Jacobson last year.

Detampel, who owns a boutique broodmare band and also owners steeplechase horses overseas, usually owns horses with partners. He is most interested in obtaining fillies and racing and breeding them.

One colt that Detampel owns, in partnership with Qatar Racing and John Stewart’s Resolute Racing, is Just a Touch, second in the Grade 1 Blue Grass Stakes last year. The son of Justify is trained by Brad Cox and he has been in steady training at Payson Park this winter.

“We really thought he had a good chance to win the Kentucky Derby,” said Detampel. “But he got messed up at the start [he broke 20th] and never had a chance.”

This past weekend, Detampel was sharing videos of Cazadero at Walsh’s barn and he will be reuniting with the gelding later this week in Kentucky.

“We owe it to our horses to give them a good post-race life. And we owe it to our sport also.”