Amanda Roxborough Interviews Kiaran McLaughlin, trainer of Charitable Man.
Kiaran P. McLaughlin (born November 15, 1960 in Lexington, Kentucky) is an American Thoroughbred racehorse trainer. Born in an area of the country where horse racing and breeding is preeminent, McLaughlin was a student at the University of Kentucky when he decided to give up his studies and pursue a career in the Thoroughbred horse racing industry. He spent close to three years as an assistant for various trainers before going to work for U.S. Racing Hall of Fame trainer, D. Wayne Lukas in 1985. In 1992 he became the agent for jockey Chris Antley, a job he held until November 1993 when he signed on as the trainer for Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum in Dubai.
In 1998, Kiaran McLaughlin was diagnosed with Multiple sclerosis and is required to take daily injections to suppress the disease.
For ten years, Kiaran McLaughlin spent half of each year working in Dubai and half in the New York city area. In both locations he trained horses for Sheik Mohammed and his brother, Sheik Hamdam. He was the leading trainer at Dubai's Nad Al Sheba Racecourse on three occasions: 1994-95, 1995-96 and 2002-2003.
McLaughlin returned to the U.S. permanently in 2003 and opened a public stable in New York. Among the horses under his care are several for Darley and Shadwell Racing. In 2006, he trained Shadwell's colt Jazil, who won the Belmont Stakes, and had enormous success with Invasor, Shadwell's newly acquired four-year-old Argentinian colt. Invasor won several Grade I races in the U.S. including the Breeders' Cup Classic and was voted U.S. Horse of the Year honors plus earned the No.1 World Thoroughbred Racehorse Ranking. In March 2007 Invasor won the world's richest horse race, the Dubai World Cup. McLaughlin's 2006 season earned him the New York Turf Writers Association (NYTWA) C.V. Whitney Achievement Award and a share of the Red Smith "Good Guy" Award with fellow trainer Tom Albertrani.
Kiaran McLaughlin, his wife and their two children, currently reside in Garden City on Long Island, New York. He is quoted as saying: "My first job in life is to be a parent."
