Sol Kumin

Kumin started 2020 with three of his horses winning their respective categories at the 2019 Eclipse Awards. These included Uni being named Female Turf Horse of the Year, British Idiom claiming the Two-Year-Old Filly award and Midnight Bisou victorious in the Older Dirt Female category. Kumin also saw victories for his two of his horses in February and March when Mr Monomoy won $400,000 Risen Star (G2) at Fair Grounds and Whitmore won the $147,000 Hot Springs Stakes for the fourth consecutive year. Later in March, Kumin’s Wells Bayou scored a front-running win in the $1 million Twinspires.com Louisiana Derby (G2) at Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots. Further wins would follow in April and May for Whitmore in the Count Fleet Sprint Handicap and Charlatan in the Arkansas Derby.

Despite attending his first race while at college Kumin didn’t get into horse-racing until much later through close friend Jay Hanley; the pair now comprising ownership group Sheep Pond Partners along with two other friends.

Kumin’s 2019 started well when Coal Front won the $1.5million Godolphin Mile in Dubai. This was the third straight year that he had won a million-dollar graded stakes on the Dubai World Cup card. The Dubai victory was followed by a win for Midnight Bisou at the $750,000 Grade 1 Apple Blossom Handicap at Oaklawn Park.

After owning winners of the two out of the four previous Preakness Stakes in Exaggerator and Justify, Kumin would claim a fourth place in 2019 when Warrior’s Charge faded in the home stretch.

Kumin sits on several other boards including Starwood Property Trust (STWD), Johns Hopkins University, Fessenden School, TOBA and Breeders’ Cup and the Trust Board at Boston Children’s Hospital. He is also a board member of Team Impact; a non-profit organisation that connects children facing serious and chronic illnesses with college sports teams.

Kumin donates a percentage of each of his horses’ Breeders’ Cup earnings to the New Vocations racehorse adoption program.

In March 2018, Kumin bought stakes in two Kentucky Derby contenders; Audible and Justify. After My Boy Jack won the Lexington Stakes and gained 20 qualification points, this would mean that Kumin had three runners in the 2018 Derby.

In August 2018, Kumin’s horse Catholic Boy won the Travers Stakes in Saratoga Springs, New York. Of the win, Kumin said “The Travers was a bucket list race for me.”

In November 2018, Monomoy Girl would follow her Kentucky Oaks’ win with victory in the Longines Breeders’ Cup Distaff. The following month, Uni took Kumin’s Grade 1 wins in 2018 to 24 when it won the Matriarch at Del Mar. Kumin would finish 2018 with 74 graded wins in total. Of Kumin’s 2018, Bob Ehalt wrote that the year was “remarkable” and had “unprecedented accomplishments”.

At the end of October 2018, Lady Eli was sold at auction to Hill ‘n’ Dale Farm for $4.2million as a broodmare. She was carrying her first foal at the time of sale. The next month saw another of Kumin’s highest profile horses leave his roster when Mind Your Biscuits retired, with Shadai Farm in Japan taking full ownership.

In April 2018 Kumin announced that following a merger of Folger Hill and Schonfeld Strategic Advisors, he would take up a new role of Chief Strategic Officer at Leucadia Asset Management, LLC in September 2018. As of January 2020, Kumin had been promoted to the position of Co-President at Leucadia Asset Management.

At the Arlington Million in Chicago in August 2017, Kumin had two successes with Beach Patrol winning the Arlington Million and Dacita the Beverly D. Stakes. He went on to say he “had an unbelievable day” and that the Million was “the race we’ve been waiting for a year.” Following his horses’ performances through the year, Kumin finished fourth in the 2017 Eclipse Awards behind Juddmonte Farms, Winchell Thoroughbreds and Godolphin Racing.

In 2016, Kumin bought a stake in the double Stakes winner Exaggerator in 2016 along with partners including Big Chief Racing and Ron Ortowski. Later that year Kumin was celebrating winning the Preakness Stakes; one of the Triple Crown Races.

In 2015, Kumin’s Undrafted, which he co-owns with former American football wide receiver Wes Welker, won the Diamond Jubilee Stakes at Royal Ascot. Of Ascot, Kumin commented “It’s an incredible place to win. When you stop and look around, the tradition and just the whole scene is different than anywhere in the world.”

Kumin had been in the sport for less than a year when he was crowned New Owner of the Year for the United States for 2015 at the Thoroughbred Owner Conference in Florida in January 2016.

After buying his first horse in 2014, Kumin’s first high profile winner was Lady Eli; purchased that same year. Named after his wife Elizabeth, Lady Eli won the Breeder’s Cup in 2014 and then went on to claim six straight wins before being struck down with laminitis after stepping on a nail.

Kumin worked at Lazard Asset Management and Sanford Bernstein before joining SAC Capital, where his roles included Head of Business Development and subsequently Chief Operating Officer under Steve A. Cohen. Upon Kumin leaving in 2014, Cohen went on to say that he (Kumin) had “been responsible for transforming our business development and investor relations functions and has helped create our global strategy and footprint. Without his tireless work, we would not have had a strong London presence or our current business in Asia.”

After leaving SAC Capital in January 2014 Kumin started hedge fund Folger Hill Asset Management with over $1billion from investors including $400million backing from Leucadia National Corp. Kumin named the hedge fund after a hill of the same name on Nantucket where he has a summer home. He does not invest his own money, but has instead grown a reputation for identifying and recruiting talented traders

Later that month, Justify landed another victory at the Preakness Stakes meaning it had won two of the three Triple Crown races with the third to be decided the following month at the Belmont Stakes. The win meant that Kumin’s horses had won the Preakness Stakes in two out of three years. Justify then went on to win the Belmont Stakes, and thus became only the 13th Triple Crown winner.

Sol Kumin (born 13 May 1975) is an American business leader, Thoroughbred racehorse owner and philanthropist. In May 2018, he became the first owner since 1952 to have Kentucky Oaks and Derby winners in the same weekend. He was a co-owner of Justify; winner of the Triple Crown – one of the hardest feats in sport.