Barclay Tagg

Barclay Tagg is best known as the trainer of 2003 Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes winner Funny Cide, but he has been a trainer for more than four decades. Tagg saddled his first winner, Tudor’s Fancy, at Philadelphia’s now-defunct Liberty Bell in Jan. 1972. In 2019, another New York-bred gave Tagg a Kentucky Derby hopeful as Tiz the Law won the Grade 1 Champagne Stakes to become a winter-book favorite for the 2020 run for the roses.

Even with the Triple Crown season altered significantly due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Tiz the Law kept his status at the top of his class through the spring and summer, winning two Kentucky Derby preps in Florida and then giving Tagg a Belmont Stakes victory when he romped in the June 20 classic at Belmont Park, which was delayed and rescheduled to serve as the opening jewel of the Triple Crown.

Tiz the Law was equally dominant in August at Saratoga, where he overwhelmed six opponents in a 5 1/2-length runaway victory in the $1 million Runhappy Travers Stakes.

In addition to Funny Cide and Tiz the Law, Tagg has trained Grade 1 winners Miss Josh, Royal Mountain Inn, Island Fashion, Showing Up, Nobiz Like Shobiz, Bit of Whimsy, Tale of Ekati, and Jersey Town.

A former steeplechase jockey and assistant to Hall of Fame trainer Frank Whiteley Jr., Tagg was born on Dec. 30, 1937 in Lancaster, Pa.