Page 52 - 22 March 2013

“They provide us the resources to make it the elegant, beautiful place that it was built to be,” Wells said. “I think our accommodations and our facility rival any racing facility anywhere.”
Scott Wells’ father Ted Wells, Jr. (left), Ray Cates and jockey Jack Wallace following Savannah Jr’s victory in the 1965 All American Futurity over a sloppy track at Ruidoso Downs. Savannah Jr was named the 1965 Champion 2-Year-Old Colt, then came back to receive 1966 Champion 3-Year-Old Colt honors.
Scott Wells aboard his camel during the Remington Park Camel Races.
While Scott Wells has worked primarily
as a trainer and track executive, he is also an accomplished author. His books include “The Nicodemus Era,” a story about Hall of Fame jockey Jerry Nicodemus, three-time winner of the All American Futurity and the regular rider of Dash For Cash. Wells wrote the novel “Teaching Narcissus to Swim” about a Quarter Horse jockey’s life, and he donates 100% of the proceeds to the Permanently Disabled Jockeys Fund.
Remington also supports many racing charities, including the Disabled Jockeys.
“We feel that’s one of the most important and underfunded groups,” said Wells. “We also support the Racetrack Chaplaincy in a big way.”
Wells has served as Remington’s general man- ager for eight years, but he has worked throughout the country, as well as in Mexico and Uruguay.
“I grew up in a racing shedrow,” said Wells. “I began writing articles for the predecessor of Speedhorse when I was 19 and going to TCU (Texas Christian University).”
Offspring of horse trainers often find themselves moving around extensively. Wells spent his early years at racetracks in New Mexico, Colorado, and Arizona. By age 21 he was training horses himself, and he was eventu- ally licensed in 14 states. He trained primarily Thoroughbreds, and his apprenticeship included time with some of the best in the business.
Wells worked with Hall of Fame trainers Jack Van Berg and D. Wayne Lukas. He was
with Van Berg in 1976, the year Van Berg set a record of 496 victories in one year, a mark that stood for nearly three decades.
“I had some good teachers,” Wells said. “I got on with Van Berg at Hot Springs (Arkansas) and also went to Sportsman’s Park and Arlington in Chicago. I always loved training horses.”
The passage of pari-mutuel racing in Oklahoma and the creation of Remington in 1988 lured Wells away from training and back to his native state. Corey Johnsen and David Vance headed up that first management team.
“I talked them into giving me a seasonal, brief job in the press box to see if I liked it,” Wells said.
That morphed into writing columns for the Daily Racing Form and some television work for Remington until he was working at the track full time.
“I was just in love with the place,” he said.
It was a Quarter Horse man, R.D. Hubbard, who in 1993 hired Wells away from Remington, though it was to work as the assistant general manager of another Thoroughbred track, Hollywood Park in Southern California. After two years there, Wells moved to another Hubbard operation, this one a major Quarter Horse facility, Ruidoso Downs in New Mexico. Wells served
as Ruidoso Down’s general manager in 1994-95 before going on to the Hubbard Museum of the American West, then called the Museum of the Horse, also in Ruidoso Downs, New Mexico.
The crowd watches the races on the north plaza at Remington Park.
Global Gaming has spent millions upgrad- ing the facility and integrating the casino and racing sides of the business...
Dustin Orona Photography Speedhorse Files
Speedhorse Files
People gather on the balcony to watch the horses get ready in the prep ring.