Longtime Owner Spalding Dies at 56

Wayne Spalding, owner of grade 1-winning turf horse Bullards Alley , died March 17 after a long battle with cancer. He was 56.

Spalding had a knack for finding low-figure horses at the sales and having great success on the track. Bullards Alley was an $11,000 purchase at the 2014 Fasig-Tipton Summer Selected Horses of Racing Age Sale. The son of Flower Alley  raced in partnership with Spalding's childhood friend Faron McCubbins. He captured the Pattison Canadian International Stakes (G1T) at Woodbine by 10 3/4 lengths, giving trainer Tim Glyshaw his first grade 1 win.

Bullards Alley recorded 40 starts over his five year career seeing a record of 6-5-7 with earnings of $928,622 for Spalding and McCubbins. His first stakes win came at 3 in the Woodchopper Stakes on the dirt, thereafter he switched to the turf to win the Louisville Handicap (G3T) at Churchill Downs the following year along with a runner-up finish in the Calumet Farm Kentucky Turf Cup Stakes (G3T) at Kentucky Downs and a third in the Sycamore Stakes (G3T) at Keeneland.

At 5, Bullards Alley returned to the Louisville Handicap to be third, took second in the Singspiel Stakes (G3T), notched the win in the Pattison, and finished the year out at Gulfstream Park with a second in the H. Allen Jerkens Stakes. He came back at 6 to run three more times, hitting the board once in the W.L. McKnight Handicap (G3T) in January.

"(Spalding) always had a great time at the races; racehorses were very important to him," trainer Tim Glyshaw said March 22. "He did really well for what most people in the industry would be considered a small-time breeder; he made a decent amount of money with them."

The Paddy O'Prado  filly Fun Paddy was sourced by Spalding from the 2018 Ocala Breeders' Sales June 2-Year-Olds and Horses of Racing Age Sale for $12,000. She ran out $215,416 for 47 efforts on the oval, with a 6-5-7 record. Two years before Fun Paddy, Spalding scooped up Dark Arden from the 2016 edition of the OBS Sale for $17,000 to have her win $232,518 on the track—she raced for him from 2 to 4.

Glyshaw commented: "He was a great guy and would do anything to help you. He gave me my first graded stakes win at Churchill when Bullards Alley won the Louisville Handicap, and my only grade 1 win after winning the Pattison."

Spalding's funeral was held Tuesday in Mt. Washington, Ky. A horse-drawn carriage driven by two Percherons carried him from the church to his final resting place.