Spotlight: Ray Baynes

Born and raised in New Zealand, Ray Baynes comes from a family of sheep farmers. “My mother’s and my father’s side, both had racehorses as a sideline to sheep farms,” told Baynes. Not as commercialized as it is here in the United States, it is very common for the horsemen to treat harness racing as a hobby to do on the side rather than a full time job.

“We were racing horses there and we had a few horses ourselves and one of my uncles came up with a champion. He won everything in New Zealand. He went to Australia and he won everything. And he came to America and they used to fly him in, they used to invite him and put races on for him. Like 100,000 dollar and 50,000 dollar races. This is where I got the bug.”

The horse’s name was Young Quinn. His connections were treated like celebrities everywhere they went, including free flights, hotels, and limousines paid for by the racetracks. “He won the American Pacing Classic, he beat Rambling Willie in that and made a ton of money.” Young Quinn even has his own Wikipedia page that outlines all of his accomplishments.

A teenager at the time, Ray’s eyes were opened to the world of harness racing and the idea of having a champion of his own. He thought, “Look at this, this is the land of gold!”

“I got a job with his trainer because I got curious with this land of gold and easy living.” At nineteen years old, Baynes worked for this trainer in both the US and New Zealand. “Then my father had a good horse at home and had an offer on it and I said to him, ‘Well if it’s worth that there then it’s worth double it here.’” So Baynes finished his contract with the trainer and then took his father’s horse over to the US.

“I went to Roosevelt first with her, then I went to Yonkers, then I went to Monticello and raced her a couple of starts and sold her for big money. So then I started importing horses. My father and I imported horses for about ten years and we brought over over 100 horses all totalled in ten years.”

Shipping costs continued to rise until Baynes decided it wasn’t as lucrative to import horses anymore. He decided to keep racing in the states and he bought a farm in Freehold in 1982. His father questioned, “Why Freehold?” But for Ray, the decision was easy, “Within a 2.5 hour ride of Freehold there was five tracks that were open all the time. Freehold was the oldest parimutuel track in the country; it’s been there forever. This was a very nice area. There was nice people, I just liked the area. The climate was tolerable. It was a nice area so I bought a farm here and that’s where I sat.”

So Ray trained, drove, shoed, and bred his own horses over the years. He has made over 5,000 starts and 3.7 million dollars as trainer and 6,000 starts and over 4 million dollars as driver since record keeping began in 1992.

Baynes also has a knack for breeding grey horses. He was given a grey mare from Jacquie Ingrassia named Witch’s Halo. “Every foal she has was grey except for one bay which was the only one that was no good,” said Baynes. Between Freehold and Monticello, Baynes won seven “grey races” with his horses, once winning two in one day at the two different tracks.

Those were always fun wins for Baynes but his proudest wins were winning open races at Yonkers and Freehold. He recalled a mare named Goodbye Trouble that he won many open races with at Freehold and has fond memories of being interviewed in the winners circle there. “It was fun to go to Freehold. You knew everybody there. You could make a good living. If you race in a competitive race, it’s a lot of fun.”

Though he never had a horse quite as famous as Young Quinn, Ray Baynes followed his dream all the way from New Zealand to right here in Freehold, New Jersey, where he has had a successful career in harness racing. He has a piece of home with him here in his herd of 150 sheep, though Standardbreds have always been Bayne’s true passion.

By Katie Eick, for Freehold Raceway