"Wayne Lukas reinvented the game," Lanny Kohnhorst, the Kentucky Thoroughbred Association's Director of Horsemen's Relations.

D. Wayne Lukas, who was raised on a 10-acre farm outside Antigo, Wisconsin, had recently been hospitalized with a severe blood infection.

Two-year-old thoroughbreds flashed past him, hooves thundering down the rail. He turned to the railbirds and half-jokingly told them, "One day, I'll just roll off this pony onto the track and let the ...