Trainer Dan Ward is no stranger to the Delaware Handicap.

As assistant to Jerry Hollendorfer, Ward had a huge hand in securing two of the trainer’s three wins in the race with Blind Luck in 2011 and Songbird in 2017. This Sunday, he’ll look for his first DelCap victory as trainer of record when he saddles Majestic Oops for owners Medallion Racing, Evan Trommer, Agave Racing Stable and Sheila Regan.

“She’s training fantastic,” Ward says of the 5-year-old mare, who’s listed as the 9/5 second choice on the morning line. “She’s very professional, and she saves [her energy] for the afternoon.”

Ward, who grew up in San Diego, went to the track straight out of high school with the hope of working for his favorite trainer, Bobby Frankel. He was able to manifest those dreams, starting out as a hotwalker and rising up the ranks, and finally served as Frankel’s assistant through most of the ‘90s. 

After taking a break from racing in 1998, he started back with Jerry Hollendorfer nine years later. Then, in 2009, a talented chestnut filly named Blind Luck entered the picture, and quickly became the stable’s big star.

“She was really an awesome horse – traveled all over, and won some big races on both synthetic and dirt [surfaces],” says Ward.

Together, they won some of the sport’s greatest races for fillies and mares, including the Kentucky Oaks and Alabama Stakes in 2010. The victories alone were sweet, but Blind Luck’s rivalry with eventual Horse of the Year Havre de Grace was one for the history books. It culminated in one final meeting in the 2011 Delaware Handicap.

Their first duel had come at this track a year before, when Blind Luck ran down the up-and-coming Havre de Grace to win the Delaware Oaks by a nose. After four more rematches, from Saratoga to Churchill to Oaklawn, each had two wins, with the other second in both cases. They’d also finished second and third, behind Unrivaled Belle, in the 2011 Breeders’ Cup Ladies Classic.

That was the score when they met each other one last tme on the afternoon of July 16, 2011. 

Ward was at Hollywood Park that day to saddle Killer Graces for the Landaluce Stakes (which she won) and wound up watching the race on television. It was no less thrilling thousands of miles away.

“That was one of the most exciting races you’ll ever see,” Ward says. The two hooked up at the three-eighths pole for an unforgettable stretch battle, neither filly willing to give an inch to the other. Finally, with one late surge, Blind Luck shoved her white-blinkered face forward and won the race at the wire.

Then, a few years later — as if one champion filly wasn’t enough — along came Songbird.

“She was a special horse. She won nine Grade 1 [races] at seven different tracks,” Ward remembers, with the last of those victories coming in the 2017 Delaware Handicap. The champion filly and eventual Hall of Fame inductee led the entire way round and, while it wasn’t her most visually impressive performance, still got the job done.

This time, Fox Hill Farm’s Rick Porter, whose Havre de Grace was on the wrong side of that photo finish back in 2011, was able to make a much-awaited trip to the winner’s circle.

“It really was a big deal for him,” Ward says of the late Porter, a Delaware native and longtime lover of racing.

In 2023, when Hollendorfer decided to focus solely on his California operations, Ward was primed to take over the trainer’s string at Monmouth Park. He had run horses in as trainer of record before, even finishing second in the Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Turf with Vasilika in 2019, but this was a big next step for the longtime assistant.

Ward has done well for himself so far, with his stats improving with each season, but the shining star of his barn is clearly Majestic Oops. He’s clearly been good for her, too. 

Before joining the trainer’s roster, the California-bred had made decent money bouncing around allowance and claiming events on the West Coast and Canada. Since she’s been with Ward, she has been better than ever: in the money in seven of nine starts, including two stakes victories and a third-place finish in the Grade 1 Ballerina Stakes last out.

Majestic Oops was also entered in the Beldame Stakes (G2) on Saturday at the Belmont at Aqueduct meet, where she would have again faced the talented Randomized, who defeated her in this summer’s Grade 3 Molly Pitcher. Ultimately, Ward opted for Delaware.

“I think this is a better spot. It’s not as tough of a race, and it’s still $400,000,” he says of Sunday’s main event. 

All in all, Ward is happy to be back with a chance to win another Delaware Handicap. This time, his own name will be on the program, and he’ll be there in person to cheer on Majestic Oops and jockey Sonny Leon down the Stanton stretch.

“There’s been so many great horses that have won here,” he says. “It’s a really important race.”