trainer
Winning in Tax Court with Thoroughbreds
Peter J. Reilly, writing in Forbes, tells of a recent tax court case won by a taxpayer claiming horse business losses, despite the taxpayer’s failure to satisfy all the classic IRS tests. The taxpayer was a successful businessman whose annual salary averaged around one million dollars from his concrete business. He suffered losses, however, from his other business—owning and racing Thoroughbreds—from which he obviously derived much pleasure. He passed some of the IRS tests, but was weak in others. However, he worked very closely with his trainer, and it was that relationship upon which the case turned. The IRS questioned, with good reason, the intensity of the taxpayer’s profit motive. However, because the taxpayer worked so closely with his trainer, the court decided that the two were essentially embarked on a joint venture, and that the trainer certainly had a strong profit motive, in that training and racing Thoroughbreds was his primary business. The court concluded that the taxpayers motive was, therefore, the same. Click to read the complete article. Posted November 22, 2014
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Leading Steeplechase Trainer Turns Huntsman
Eva Smithwick and Hey Doctor / Douglas Lees photo
Eva Smithwick captured the Leading Trainer title on the Virginia Point-to-Point circuit this year. It was her and husband Speedy Smithwick’s first year back in Virginia after seventeen years in Kentucky training on the flat tracks. As if being a top trainer doesn’t keep her sufficiently busy, she’s agreed to hunt hounds for Snickersville this season.
The Snickersville foxhounds hunt over Sunny Bank Farm in Middleburg, home of the late Dot Smithwick. Eva, having returned to Sunny Bank with Speedy to continue his mother’s training business, just couldn’t say no to MFH Greg Ryan.
“Greg is a persistent fellow,” said Eva. “Every time the dinner conversation turned to the question of who would hunt hounds this year, Greg would stare at me.”
