WinStar Farm LLC and Flay, Bobby

In 2000, Kenny Troutt and Bill Casner, founders of Excel Communications, a long-distance telephone service and communications company, founded WinStar Farm after buying the 1,450-acre Prestonwood Farm property near Versailles, Ky., from brothers Art, Jack and J.R. Preston. In 2010, Troutt bought out Casner’s portion of WinStar, and is now the sole owner. With the Race Track Chaplaincy of America, Troutt created the White Horse Award, presented annually to a farm or racetrack worker who performs an unselfish heroic act.

WinStar has focused on developing a leading breeding program and stands leading sire Distorted Humor, among others. It first gained national fame as the breeder of 2003 Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes winner Funny Cide, a son of Distorted Humor.

In 2008 WinStar won the Grade 1 Goodwood Stakes with Well Armed, who went on to win the Dubai World Cup in 2009. The following year the farm won the Kentucky Derby with Super Saver while Drosselmeyer won the 2010 Belmont Stakes. After the 2010 season, WinStar received its first Eclipse Award for outstanding owner. In 2011, Drosselmeyer won the Breeders’ Cup Classic.

WinStar claimed a third-place finish in the 2013 Kentucky Derby with Revolutionary, who also won both the Louisiana Derby (Grade 2) and Withers Stakes (Grade 3). In 2015 WinStar partnered with Stonestreet Stables to campaign Carpe Diem to a win in the Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland. With a record of four wins and a second from five starts in his career, Carpe Diem went off as the third choice in the Kentucky Derby, but finished unplaced.

In 2016, WinStar won the Arkansas Derby with Creator, who subsequently was unplaced in the Kentucky Derby after enduring a troubled trip. He rebounded in a big way, however, in the Belmont Stakes when he rallied powerfully to nip Destin for the win in the closing strides.

Prior to the Belmont Stakes, WinStar sold a minority interest in Creator to Bobby Flay. The celebrity chef has sizzled in the kitchen and on the racetrack; Flay’s filly More Than Real won the 2010 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf and the chef is on the board of the New York Racing Association. Flay can often be found at Saratoga and Belmont in New York as well as at the Breeders’ Cup and major horse sales across the country. 

Flay is the owner of highly acclaimed restaurants Bar Americain, Bobby Flay Steak, Bobby’s Burger Palace, Gato and Mesa Grill, which opened in 1991 and was Flay's first restaurant. Mesa Grill was named Best Restaurant for 1992 by New York Magazine food critic Gael Greene. 

In addition to his restaurants, Flay shares his knowledge and enthusiasm for food via cookbooks as well as cooking shows on the Food Network, Cooking Channel and NBC. 

Flay owns 2015 Grade 1 winner Dame Dorothy and owns and bred graded stakes winner America.