Join now & win money today! Get Started

John Parisella Passes Away

---

John Parisella, a top trainer in New York and California for decades and one of the sport’s most colorful figures, passed away Friday July 3 at a Long Island hospital. He was 85.

The news was confirmed by family friend and fellow trainer Bruce Levine. Levine believes Parisella passed away as the result of a head injury he suffered in a fall.

“His health had been declining pretty good the last year, year and a half,” Levine said. “For whatever reason, he kept falling and losing his balance. A friend of his went to see him last Sunday and found him unconscious in his apartment. There was blood all over the place. They took him to the hospital. He never regained consciousness from there. He fell all the time. Maybe two weeks before he died, he told me, ‘Bruce I am going to die from falling.’ It started about two years ago. He fell in a Dunkin’ Donuts and they had to take him to the hospital and stitch him up. I begged him to go to assisted living. He wouldn’t do it. He was stubborn about certain things.”

Parisella began his career in 1976 and ran his last horse in 2016. He won 960 races during his career, including 22 graded stakes races. His best horse may have been Simply Majestic, a winner of 14 stakes races. He finished third in the 1984 GI Preakness Stakes with Fight Over and Simply Majestic finished third in the 1988 GI Breeders’ Cup Mile.

Parisella was born in Brooklyn to an Italian Catholic family and started his career as an assistant to Tommy Gullo. His mentor later became Johnny Campo.

His primary owner in New York was Ted Sabarese. The two campaigned 1983 for GIII Nashua winner Don Rickles.

While in California, he trained for several actors, including Jack Klugman, Don Adams, Don Rickles,Telly Savalas and James Caan. It was Klugman who gave him the nickname “Trainer to the Stars.”

In 1975, Parisella married Bernadette Birk, the former wife of trainer Bobby Frankel. Parisella and Frankel were originally friends as well as competitors, but it was Parisella who has largely been given credit for raising his step-daughter Bethenny Frankel.

Levine worries that the new generation will forget the top trainers of the seventies and eighties like Parisella.

“John had a great run,” Levine said. “The new generation, they don’t know trainers like John or Frank Martin. Even Woody Stephens, if he didn’t win five Belmonts no one would remember him. ‘The Chief,’  Allen Jerkens, I’m not sure people remember him.”

The post John Parisella Passes Away appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Greatest Joy Becomes First Winner for Greatest Honour at Presque Isle

---

Greatest Joy became freshman sire Greatest Honour’s first winner with a professional stalk-and-pounce effort at Presque Isle Downs Monday.

The longest shot on the board at 10-1 odds, she watched Castle Dark (Peace and Justice) set the early tempo through an opening quarter in :22.82 on an uncontested advantage. Responding when called on for a rally in the lane, she was on even terms with the long time leader by the eighth pole and had pulled clear of that one not long after. From there she extended her advantage to 1 1/4 lengths on the wire.

Greatest Joy is the second winner from as many to the races for Rossellini, a half-sister to GISW Red Knight (Pure Prize) and MSW Macagone (Artie Schiller). The broodmare has produce five fillies in a row thus far with her most recent being a yearling Khozan and a 2026 Casa Creed.

Sire Greatest Honour is out of an unplaced daughter of 2007 Broodmare of the Year Better Than Honour (Deputy minister), making his dam a half-sister to champion 3-year-old filly MGISW Rags to Riches (A.P. Indy) and GI Belmont Stakes hero Jazil (Seeking the Gold). He hails from the immediate female family of GISW Streaming (Smart Strike) and Canadian champion older dirt male Tyson (Tapit) as well as being the extended one of Group 1-placed Arabian Hope (Distorted Humor); champion 3-year-old colt Arcangelo (Arrogate); and the late MGSW Cezanne (Curlin).

1st-Presque Isle Downs, $33,730, Msw, 7-6, 2yo, f, 5f (AWT), :57.84, ft, 1 1/4 lengths.
GREATEST JOY (f, 2, Greatest Honour–Rossellini, by Freud) Lifetime Record: 1-1-0-0, $18,600. Click for the Equibase.com chart or VIDEO, sponsored by FanDuel TV.
O/B-Divine Light Healing Ministries (FL); T-Kevin Rice.

The post Greatest Joy Becomes First Winner for Greatest Honour at Presque Isle appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

John Parisella Passes Away

---

John Parisella, a top trainer in New York and California for decades and one of the sport’s most colorful figures, passed away Friday July 3 at a Long Island hospital. He was 85.

The news was confirmed by family friend and fellow trainer Bruce Levine. Levine believes Parisella passed away as the result of a head injury he suffered in a fall.

“His health had been declining pretty good the last year, year and a half,” Levine said. “For whatever reason, he kept falling and losing his balance. A friend of his went to see him last Sunday and found him unconscious in his apartment. There was blood all over the place. They took him to the hospital. He never regained consciousness from there. He fell all the time. Maybe two weeks before he died, he told me, ‘Bruce I am going to die from falling.’ It started about two years ago. He fell in a Dunkin’ Donuts and they had to take him to the hospital and stitch him up. I begged him to go to assisted living. He wouldn’t do it. He was stubborn about certain things.”

Parisella began his career in 1976 and ran his last horse in 2016. He won 960 races during his career, including 22 graded stakes races. His best horse may have been Simply Majestic, a winner of 14 stakes races. He finished third in the 1984 GI Preakness Stakes with Fight Over and Simply Majestic finished third in the 1988 GI Breeders’ Cup Mile.

Parisella was born in Brooklyn to an Italian Catholic family and started his career as an assistant to Tommy Gullo. His mentor later became Johnny Campo.

His primary owner in New York was Ted Sabarese. The two campaigned 1983 for GIII Nashua winner Don Rickles.

While in California, he trained for several actors, including Jack Klugman, Don Adams, Don Rickles,Telly Savalas and James Caan. It was Klugman who gave him the nickname “Trainer to the Stars.”

In 1975, Parisella married Bernadette Birk, the former wife of trainer Bobby Frankel. Parisella and Frankel were originally friends as well as competitors, but it was Parisella who has largely been given credit for raising his step-daughter Bethenny Frankel.

Levine worries that the new generation will forget the top trainers of the seventies and eighties like Parisella.

“John had a great run,” Levine said. “The new generation, they don’t know trainers like John or Frank Martin. Even Woody Stephens, if he didn’t win five Belmonts no one would remember him. ‘The Chief,’  Allen Jerkens, I’m not sure people remember him.”

The post John Parisella Passes Away appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Greatest Joy Becomes First Winner for Greatest Honour at Presque Isle

---

Greatest Joy became freshman sire Greatest Honour’s first winner with a professional stalk-and-pounce effort at Presque Isle Downs Monday.

The longest shot on the board at 10-1 odds, she watched Castle Dark (Peace and Justice) set the early tempo through an opening quarter in :22.82 on an uncontested advantage. Responding when called on for a rally in the lane, she was on even terms with the long time leader by the eighth pole and had pulled clear of that one not long after. From there she extended her advantage to 1 1/4 lengths on the wire.

Greatest Joy is the second winner from as many to the races for Rossellini, a half-sister to GISW Red Knight (Pure Prize) and MSW Macagone (Artie Schiller). The broodmare has produce five fillies in a row thus far with her most recent being a yearling Khozan and a 2026 Casa Creed.

Sire Greatest Honour is out of an unplaced daughter of 2007 Broodmare of the Year Better Than Honour (Deputy minister), making his dam a half-sister to champion 3-year-old filly MGISW Rags to Riches (A.P. Indy) and GI Belmont Stakes hero Jazil (Seeking the Gold). He hails from the immediate female family of GISW Streaming (Smart Strike) and Canadian champion older dirt male Tyson (Tapit) as well as being the extended one of Group 1-placed Arabian Hope (Distorted Humor); champion 3-year-old colt Arcangelo (Arrogate); and the late MGSW Cezanne (Curlin).

1st-Presque Isle Downs, $33,730, Msw, 7-6, 2yo, f, 5f (AWT), :57.84, ft, 1 1/4 lengths.
GREATEST JOY (f, 2, Greatest Honour–Rossellini, by Freud) Lifetime Record: 1-1-0-0, $18,600. Click for the Equibase.com chart or VIDEO, sponsored by FanDuel TV.
O/B-Divine Light Healing Ministries (FL); T-Kevin Rice.

The post Greatest Joy Becomes First Winner for Greatest Honour at Presque Isle appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.