BC's Big Spender Peter Redekop Invests in the Sport He Loves

Peter Redekop said donating $100,000 to augment the purse of the British Columbia Derby (Grade 3) is an opportunity to give back to the race that has been his major fixation since he jumped into the game 50 years ago. But it’s nothing new for the prominent BC owner and breeder. He has been making at least five-figure annual donations to pump up stakes purses at Hastings Racecourse for many years now. Apart from supporting the event he loves, the 84-year-old member of the BC Horse Racing Hall of Fame said his latest donation is simply a practical gesture to attract people to the sport.

“We’ve got to get some people to notice us,” Redekop said of the donation that pushes the BC Derby purse to $250,000. “I won three BC Derbys in a row and at that time it was $250,000. The betting is just way down. So, I thought I would supplement the purse.”

Hastings Racecourse general manager Darren MacDonald said management of the track was, “delighted to have Mr. Redekop sponsor the BC Derby this year. Getting the purse back to $250,000 should definitely improve the quality of the field and without his support that just wouldn’t have been possible.”

Scroll to continue with content

Bryan Anderson — who with his wife, Carol, manages all of Redekop’s horse racing affairs — said Redekop, a Vancouver real estate magnate, is an exceptionally generous person.

“It’s not just in the racing business, but he and his family set up a business school at the Canadian Mennonite University in Winnipeg. He also built a beautiful Mennonite Heritage Museum in Abbotsford, BC. He does a lot of charity,” Bryan said. “Racing in BC is in a difficult time. We’re losing a lot of the breeders and we’ve lost a lot of the owners and we have a shortage of horses and he just wants to step up to the plate and do his part to help racing carry on and be as good as it can be under the conditions. That’s the way he is. He’s a wonderful man, he’s a generous guy and he has the wherewithal to do these things.”

Redekop jumped into horse racing in 1968 with his cousin and business partner Peter Wall. The pair spent more than 25 years — and princely sums — trying to win the BC Derby without success until finally cashing in with Squire Jones in 1994.

“We kept bringing horses over (from California) to win the BC Derby and we could never win the BC Derby,” Redekop said. “They would be the favourite and they would run dead last. One time, the trainer came — Farrell Jones from Santa Anita. So we decided we were going to celebrate the day before the races in the evening, have a big party. So, we did. We still didn’t win it, but we had a lot of fun. We had been trying so hard. Then Peter and I separated with our horses, he wanted to go more into breeding and I wanted to stay in racing, more so than breeding, because it isn’t that exciting to watch broodmares.”

After winning with Squire Jones, it would be another 18 years until Redekop would find himself in the BC Derby winner’s circle. In 2012, he won with Second City, starting a three-year stranglehold on the race that included wins in 2013 with Title Contender and 2014 with Alert Bay.

CHASING THE OTHER DERBY

Redekop’s tremendous string of good luck in the BC Derby— nearly 45 years in the making — followed running in the 2006 Kentucky Derby with Cause To Believe. The son of Maria’s Mon out of Imaginary Cat, trained by Jerry Hollendorfer and ridden by Russell Baze, finished 13th the year beloved Barbaro won the Run for the Roses.

“Jerry Hollendorfer bought (Cause To Believe) for us for $50,000 (as a yearling). He could really run, but then the last race (before the Derby), which was in April, we ran in the Illinois Derby and he ran third. We expected him to win, of course. So, we were all geared up for the Kentucky Derby and I wanted to cancel it, but the trainer and everybody in the family wanted to go. So, we went. We had a super time, but the horse didn’t do that well and after that, he tailed off very quickly.”

Still, Redekop said he wouldn’t change the experience for the world, despite there being 157,000 people at the race, making getting around Churchill Downs very difficult.

“They give you a box at the track, which was very good,” Redekop said. “They actually had a chaperone that, basically, took you around, because even going to the washroom was a problem. There was just people milling around all the time — and you didn’t know where it was. So, they really, really did a good job, you know, especially for people like us that had horses in the race.”

Ever since, Redekop has been chasing the Kentucky Derby with increasing vigour.

The fact BC-based John Gunther bred 2018 Triple Crown winner Justify, served as a major motivation to Redekop.

“I know him and then I looked to see who sired that horse and it was Scat Daddy. So, I decided to buy a Scat Daddy,” Redekop said.

A month after Justify won the Kentucky Derby, Redekop paid $360,000 to buy Anothertwistafate at the Ocala Breeders’ Sales Company’s Two-Year-Olds and Horses of Racing Age auction.

“I’m going up in the money,” Redekop said, laughing. “He’s a big sucker, which is totally opposite Alert Bay. He can really run. So, he’s going to run.

“In the first race at Santa Anita, he got boxed in and they were knocking him back and forth. That was a maiden race (in November of 2018). He didn’t do well. But this year, he won his maiden race at Golden Gate really easily. Then he won the second race at Golden Gate really easily. They never touched him. He just went in the middle of the stretch and they just asked him to run a little bit and he opened up five or six lengths. Now he’s going at Golden Gate in the El Camino Real (on Feb. 16).”

The race is a Kentucky Derby prep and Bryan Anderson — the man with the Cause2Believe email address — said he dreams “just about every day” about running Anothertwistafate in this year’s Kentucky Derby.

“There’s a long way to go, yet, but this horse isn’t a fluke… he looks like he’s of that ilk,” Bryan said. “He could be any kind of a horse. He’s had three starts and two very impressive wins. He’s training great and he’s got it all. He’s got the pedigree, he’s got the looks and he seems to have the ability.”

Bryan said the recent success of BC players in North America’s biggest races has provided some inspiration.

“John Gunther bred Justify, he’s a BC guy. Chuck Fipke, who just ran second in the Pegasus, is a BC guy. It’s not like BC is a stranger to success in the horse business,” Bryan said.

Anothertwistafate isn’t the only high-priced young horse on which Redekop has some hope.

“Scat Daddy is dead now, as you know. So, I bought an American Pharoah. He’s a beautiful looking colt and he’s really royally bred. He’s a 2-year-old,” Redekop said of the colt out of Danceinthesunlight purchased for $300,000 at the Fasig-Tipton October Yearling sale. “He doesn’t have a name, yet. But those (American Pharoah) horses I’m told are beautiful horses and they’ve gone for huge, huge dollars. None of them have run, yet, of course. This is the first year.”

Redekop said Anothertwistafate and the American Pharoah colt are “the most expensive young horses I’ve bought.”

Bryan said Redekop, who has some 50 horses in total counting breeding stock, also has some other nice racehorses. “A mare called Alliford Bay has won six or seven stakes wins in a row,” Bryan said. “Another horse called Anyportinastorm has had two stakes wins in a row and is a nice horse. He won the Zia Park Spring in his last start. He’s got a bunch.”

Recent top horses no longer able to compete as stakes horses have a home at Bryan and Carol’s farm.

Hollywood Hit, the 2010 Sovereign Award winner as Champion Sprinter and a winner of the 2010 Vigil Stakes (Grade 3) at Woodbine en route to earnings of $622,156, is currently roaming a field beside Comedero, a winner of more than $675,000 and victor of the 2010 Chick Lang Stakes (presented by Apple Ford) (Grade 3) at Pimlico.

“Peter never ran them for a tag when they couldn’t compete in stakes/allowance company,” Bryan said. “He just turned them out. It’s unfortunate that more people aren’t like that.”

WAR REFUGEE

Redekop long ago learned to count his blessings.

Born in 1935 in a Mennonite colony in the former Soviet Union — in the area now known as Ukraine — Redekop’s family was oppressed by the Communists for their religious beliefs and displaced in Germany for two years after World War II ended.

“We basically didn’t have any food to eat. I was 10 years old and I remember it very vividly. I will never forget it,” Redekop said.

After spending a few years in The Netherlands, Redekop and his family immigrated to Canada in 1948, landing in Winnipeg.

“We ended up in Winnipeg on December the 2nd and just about froze to death. We weren’t used to that,” Redekop said. “That was really extreme. We didn’t have proper clothes because we just had the clothes on our backs and they were just ordinary, normal clothes; nothing for a winter like that. Then, four months later, we moved to BC. I am the youngest in the family, and my middle brothers were 15 and 17, and we could work picking berries and raspberries and hops and all that to help earn a few dollars, which is what we needed.”

Eventually, Redekop and Wall started buying real estate and building homes.

“We started building houses in Vancouver for $13,900, which was a small, two- or three-bedroom, a starter home. They’re now worth over $1 million of $1.5 million. It was relatively easy to make money. We, basically, went gung ho. We did a lot of stuff. We built 15,000 or 20,000 units, that was condo units and apartments,” Redekop said.

His first exposure to horse racing came on a trip to the Pacific National Exhibition (PNE) and it left an indelible impression.

“It was exciting. So, then I started asking people, ‘How you get into it? How do you own horses?’ ‘Oh well, you buy some.’ So, I went to the next yearling sale and I bought one for $800 and one for $500,” Redekop said, laughing at the memory.

He went in cold and picked out his own horses.

“I like doing things myself. No help, nothing. I had to get a trainer, of course. They say that’s how you do it. But we were as green as grass. Neither of the horses wanted to race.

“I wasn’t discouraged, but I kind of realized at that point that you need somebody that knows about it, because we were in real estate and building.

“It was just a hobby. It was the excitement. It was fun. I never expected to make money, which I haven’t… They call it the Sport of Kings and now I know why, because only kings, in most cases, can afford it.”

Redekop laughs as he says this. Horse racing has never been about the money for him. It’s about making his life immeasurably richer.

HORSES HAVE MADE A RICHER LIFE

“I’ve won a lot of races (at Hastings) and my family comes. We have three daughters and three son-in-laws and eight grandkids. If we have a big race, they come and we really enjoy it,” Redekop said.

Bryan and Carol Anderson are also enjoying the ride. The couple have long known Redekop, who is well known in BC racing circles. But it wasn’t until they sold Redekop a Vying Victor gelding named Alabama Rain that they began working for Redekop.

“We sold him this horse that went on to win the (2005) Canadian Derby as a 3-year-old. That year Carol and I were voted the Outstanding Breeders in Canada. We won the TOBA Award. Part of that was because of Alabama Rain. That’s when Peter and I first started speaking on friendly terms. That really was the start of it all,” Bryan said.

“I’ve been in the business a long time. I was a veterinarian at the racetrack for several years. I was vice-president of the CTHS national at one time. I’ve been in the business, and so has my wife. Carol was the manager of the CTHS office here in BC for several years and did the provincial magazine. We go a long ways back in the racing industry and it’s so nice for us to be able to play in this game at a very high level, and be involved at a very high level.”

Redekop, Bryan said, is not only generous, but smart.

“He’s been around racing a long time and he knows racing. He makes good decisions and he knows when to sell horses and he’s always game to buy good horses. It’s been very interesting for me,” Bryan said.

All that aside, Redekop said the industry has many challenges in British Columbia and he hopes the BC government will recognize the importance of racing and make some changes to help it.

“I just hope that our governments basically see that this is an industry that they just can’t let die. It employs a lot of people,” he said.

At the same time, the government is something of a competitor to horse racing.

“The provincial government started all these slot places, and that, basically, takes away from the horse racing,” Redekop said. “You go and get free parking, you get in and you bet. Whereas, you go to the races, Hastings charges you $12 or $15 for parking to get in. They have some slots, but people don’t pay $15 to park to lose money in the slots. So, it’s just not working out… When the PNE is on, they charge $25 to get in… Are they supposed to come and pay $25 for parking to basically use the slot machines when all of the other casinos have free parking? The idea was the slots were supposed to help.”

Meanwhile, betting is declining and stakes purses with it. That’s one of the reasons Redekop dips into his own pocket to support them. He said racing needs big days and big events such as the BC Derby.

Darren MacDonald at Hastings said racing needs more people like Redekop.

“Mr. Redekop is without a doubt one of the most influential people in racing in British Columbia,” said MacDonald. “From supporting the CTHS sales to years of racing horses at Hastings, people like Mr. Redekop are key to the survival of the industry and for that we can’t thank him enough.”

As for the other Derby, the one in Kentucky, Redekop said he’s excited to see what Anothertwistafate can do on Feb. 16 (after press time) in the El Camino Real prep for the Derby at Golden Gate.

“Maybe this guy…,” Redekop said, pausing to dream for a second. “He’s bred to go long. He’s not a sprinter. So now we’re going to go down to San Francisco and watch him run on the 16th. I don’t fly as much as I used to, but I will go to Golden Gate.”

Make no mistake, Anothertwistafate will have to earn his spot in the Kentucky Derby starting gate.

“I decided I wasn’t going to take a horse just to run,” Redekop said. “We want a shot. Otherwise, we’ll just go and pick other big races out. There’s lots of 3-year-old races during the year. We’ll go and enjoy them.”

Fifty years on, seeing his horses run never gets old for Peter Redekop.