Braeburn to Colonial road paved with anticipation
Virginia trainers eager for Colonial Downs meet to kick off
Nick Hahn
June 11, 2026
It’s a two-hour drive from the Braeburn Training Center in Crozet, Virginia, to Colonial Downs: a rolling voyage through young Virginia timber broken up by occasional farm fields before passing through Richmond, and plenty of time to ponder.
“It’s a nice drive,” said Patrick Nuesch, who usually drives his own horses from Braeburn to Colonial. “You hope that you’re in the right spot and doing good.”
If you win, the ride back gets better.
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“You’ve still got adrenaline,” continued Nuesch. “No worries about falling asleep at the wheel.”
Nuesch owns and runs Braeburn, which was started by his father Felix in 1984. The facility has a 5 1/2-furlong dirt training track and a five-furlong inner turf course surrounded by paddocks in front of the scenic backdrop of the Blue Ridge mountains.
Nuesch, who exercises his own horses, puts as much care into the surfaces as into the horses he gallops over them. He’s been known to hop on a tractor to harrow and to fill the water truck he drives from one of the ponds on the property.
Big Lick Farm, owned by Crozet residents Reid and Sarah Nagle, leases stalls at the training center. Reid began owning horses around the turn of the century and Sarah began riding horses in the mornings for Patrick in 2001. The farm name is a bit of financial slang for occasions when horses sold well, as in “that was a big lick.”
“It’s a really beautiful spot that we’ve been lucky to train out of many years now,” observed Sarah. “We both have almost a quarter of the century here, which is sort of scary.”
Crozet’s current population estimate of about 10,000 residents has quadrupled since the Nagles came to Braeburn. Star Hill Brewery is now located a driver and a five-iron from the farm, and the four-way intersection in the center of town can be subject to traffic backups. A tree line on the property boundary buffers those roads to keep Braeburn rustic.
Nagle pointed out the benefits of the training center.
“The track is so well maintained and so quiet but also the fact that we turn our horses out,” she said. “That’s a big part of our program. Our horses don’t always thrive going to a racetrack environment. Pat’s got the really nice turf gallops. During the week when it rained every day, we were galloping up on the turf, and the horses love that.”
The two entities stabling a couple dozen horses each at Braeburn are focused on the upcoming meet at Colonial Downs, which starts June 25 with average daily purses over $600,000. That’s typical; both outfits will start horses at other venues, but their focus is on the in-state meet.
Nagle has only started eight horses in 2026 and Nuesch only one. That’ll change with the upcoming Colonial meet.
“We really do try to have them ready for the now 47 days of racing we’ll have this year,” said Nagle on Off to the Races Radio on May 30. “Time will tell what races will go and who’s ready, but all bases loaded for Colonial, hopefully.”
Finch, a three-year-old Oscar Performance filly who broke her maiden at first asking in the closing week of last year’s meet at Colonial Downs, is pointed to the first week of this year’s upcoming meet. Contra and Whaleaxe raced the May 30 and May 31, respectively, putting them on schedule for early Colonial dates.
“The spacing is right, both of them are ready for the beginning of the meet at Colonial,” assessed Nagle. “Everyone’s got conditions and spots up there picked out.”
Both racing entities at Braeburn have had their moments at Colonial Downs.
In 2007, Nuesch met five of his first six starters of Colonial’s meet in the winner’s circle after their races, all claimers. In a similar period between the end of the 2012 meet and the opening of the 2013 meet at Colonial Downs, seven of his eleven starters made the winner’s circle.
Nagle’s then-two-year-old Cavalier Cupid won the Keswick Stakes in 2021 in becoming the first dual winner of that 21-day meet. She also gave Sarah Nagle her first stakes win as a trainer that day. Cavalier Cupid went 2-for-2 that year at Colonial and now is in a different role for the Nagles.
“She’s in foal this year which is really exciting for us,” updated Nagle. “She had little issues along the way, but she came back [to win] a two-other-than (allowance) at Colonial last year. You would have thought we won a Breeder’s Cup race. We were so happy. We love winning at our home track, and Braeburn is a big part of that, because that’s where we’re based.”
The average daily purses at Colonial Downs are expected to be over $600,000 again this year, making winning difficult. But the Braeburn outfits are optimistic.
That optimism is hard won. During the era when Colonial Downs was shuttered from 2013 to 2019 and prior to implementation of Virginia’s Certified Residency Program, Nuesch could count the number of horses in his barn on both hands.
“The program should certainly generate funding long term,” Nuesch predicted in The Racing Biz in 2018 as the program was emerging. “It’s kept us in business.”
It’s done that and more.
Rest assured that the road leading in and out from Braeburn isn’t gravel or dirt. It’s paved with asphalt and anticipation.
Pick up reliable and rewarding tickets for major events!
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