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Too Salty would be a sweet winner

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August 01, 2007

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This Saturday, Donald Bartling hopes to enjoy a sweet victory at the Meadowlands with a colt named Too Salty. Bartling, an engineer for Northrop Grumman in Baltimore, is the sole owner of Hambletonian finalist Too Salty. His colt is rated at 15-1 from post five in the Hambletonian Final on Saturday.

Trained by Doug Miller, Too Salty finished second to Adrian Chip in his elimination race last Saturday to give Bartling his first finalist in eight years of owning trotters.

In 1999, Bartling made the switch from pacers when his friend, Eli Solomon, approached him with a deal.

"He walked up to me at a sale, opened the catalog and said we're gonna buy this horse," Bartling said. "That was SJ's Caviar. That was my first trotter."

While SJ's Caviar was not eligible for the Hambletonian, he won 15 of 20 races and earned $1.2 million during his three-year-old season.

"As a 2 year old in January or February, which was the time for the $500 sustaining fee [for the Hambletonian], he was ill," Bartling said. "The illness went through the barn, one of Eli's horses actually died, so we were just happy he was alive. Eli didn't think he would be able to do anything so we didn't pay the fee. I didn't agree with that. I believe in sustaining for anything that's reasonable."

And now, Bartling is getting a second chance with Too Salty, who is a son of SJ�s Caviar out of the mare Valley Amber.

"In 1969, I had a friend at work from New York, and he pestered me and pestered me to go to the races," Bartling said. "I finally went, and I was hooked. I was a handicapper and a bettor. I was a damn good handicapper, but I couldn't bet."

In 1983, he and a group of friends went in as partners, and he has owned horses ever since. And while his company, Northrop Grumman, specializes in radar, Bartling uses Miller's intuition when it comes to buying.

"Doug picked Too Salty," Bartling said. "He knew the horses. I defer to my trainer. For years, he has picked the horses, inspected them. I had done my homework and all that, and decided I would totally depend on Doug Miller and let him pick the horse for me. I like to pick good people; I carry that through everything, my business and personal matters."

Too Salty's career got put on hold, however, when a hairline fracture of the pastern bone sidelined him for his 2-year-old season. Despite his inactivity that year, Miller and Bartling still had high hopes.

"When he started this year, he was basically starting out from scratch, seeing everything for the first time,� Bartling said. "It's just something where, you sustain him [with stakes payments], and hope for the best. But this is a great surprise." (Meadowlands)

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