Preakness Stakes
The jockey Javier Castellano celebrated with his team in the winner’s circle after he rode Mage to victory at Churchill Downs.
They came from the owners’ suites, the second floor of the grandstand, the rail. From California and Michigan and beyond. They were not going to miss this moment. Their horse had just won the Kentucky Derby, and the winner’s circle beckoned.
Among those wearing white Mage hats were Brian Doxtator and Chase Chamberlin, whose Commonwealth app allows fans to buy shares in racehorses like Mage for as little as $50. Soon shares in up-and-coming golfers will be offered. It takes about 60 seconds to invest in an athlete the first time, and about 30 seconds thereafter. Think part fantasy football, part investing, part pure fun.
“Yes, we’re a technology platform and we sell shares and you could potentially make money, but really what we’re doing is we’re building a community of really passionate sports fans,” Doxtator said. “We call them the Big Day Out crowd — people that if they’re going to go do something they call five of their friends.”
Commonwealth and its users own 25 percent of Mage; the trainer Gustavo Delgado Sr., the bloodstock agent Ramiro Restrepo and the real estate investor Sam Herzberg own the rest. For the $3 million Derby, a $50 share produced $95 after taxes. While that doesn’t seem like a lot, especially when a $50 bet to win on the 15-1 Mage would have produced $810.50, investors have been earning on every race he has run and will receive a percentage of what is likely to be a multimillion-dollar breeding deal. They also have behind-the-scenes access to the horse and his training regimen and the opportunity to attend workouts and races.
Doxtator and Chamberlin grew up in Kalamazoo, Mich., and attended Western Michigan University. Doxtator, who now lives in Los Angeles, went to a car auction and noticed a company selling shares in cars. He was intrigued by the idea and started thinking about ways to improve upon that concept. Then he went to Santa Anita racetrack. Days later, he messaged his old friend Chamberlin, a lifelong equestrian who had moved to Lexington, Ky., and started to dabble in horse racing, and pitched the idea.
“We thought of the horse racing audience as like a bull’s-eye kind of target,” Doxtator, 40, said. “You’ve got the core audience in the middle. Then you’re one ring out and it’s the casual fan that might go to the races a bit, pays attention, and then you go another ring out, and you’ve got people that pretty much only watch the Derby and have never really been to the track. You put those two outer rings together, and if you can convert even 5 to 10 percent of those, it’s a game changer for horse racing.”
Doxtator and Chamberlin launched the app in early 2021, and by the summer they had partnered with WinStar Farm and were offering shares in Country Grammer, who went on to win the $12 million Dubai World Cup in 2022. They have also partnered with top bloodstock agents, which is how they connected with Restrepo and landed a share of Mage.
About 80 of the 382 people who invested in Mage through Commonwealth were at the Derby. And so that melting pot of a group rode Mage straight into the winner’s circle on the first Saturday in May, leading to perhaps the biggest winner’s circle party in Derby history — even Mage looked small in the middle of it.
“It’s one of those weird things you don’t want to talk about too much, because you don’t want to jinx yourself or whatever, but we told people, if we win, just go,” Chamberlin, 32, said. “You have your Commonwealth pin on. Nobody’s going to stop you.”
One of the Commonwealth investors was Norma Barnes-Euresti from Battle Creek, Mich. When her wheelchair got stuck on the track, Gerardo Corrales and Jose Ortiz, who had just rode in the Derby, carried her the rest of the way.
“I don’t have legs today, but I got the ride of a lifetime,” she said on NBC, speaking about the jockeys’ kindness and, of course, her Triple Crown contender Mage.
The winner’s circle experience was the lasting memory of that day for Doxtator and Chamberlin. About 100 investors will be attending the Preakness.
“I’ll never forget standing there and seeing Mage start to work his way over and everyone’s going, ‘Hey, you have to stand here for the photo,’ and out of the corner of my eye, I see like this mass of people all wearing Mage hats,” Doxtator said. “That was a surprise to me. And I’m like, ‘Oh, great, the crew’s getting in here.’ It was such a moment for us. I will cherish that photo forever.”
Said Chamberlin: “Honestly, I look back and I see a $50 shareholder that somehow got his hands on the trophy, and another woman leaving with roses, and it’s like, that’s pretty hallowed ground.”
On Saturday, the oldest investor in Mage — Chamberlin’s 89-year-old grandfather, Gordon Chamberlin — will be in attendance. He watched the Derby with Chamberlin’s father, Mike, another investor, in Michigan, and the two sobbed when Mage won. In that moment, the elder Chamberlins knew they needed to be at the Preakness.
And this time, one thing will be different: The unlikely owners will all be sitting together in the turfside terrace in the infield, and they will have a clear path to the winner’s circle.
Source: The New York Times
