Hall comes home to win at Belmont

Richard Tedesco

George Hall had fond memories of Belmont Park race track even before his horse, Ruler on Ice, took off down the home stretch to win the $1 million Belmont Stakes last Saturday.

For the graduate of Chaminade High School – class of 1978 – Belmont was one of the first tracks he visited when he was still attending grammar school at the St. Aidan School in Williston Park.

“My affection for horse racing started at Belmont. It was great to win the race on the track there,” Hall said. “There’s a little bit of disbelief because winning is so difficult. It was shocking. It was spectacular.”

Hall’s grandfather, Lawrence Fagan, introduced him to the sport, taking him to that track and others in his younger years.

“I started going to Belmont, Aqueduct and Saratoga sometimes in the summer,” Hall said. “They’re wonderful animals. I loved to see them race.”

He said he also liked to put down small bets on those horses he enjoyed watching. Hall quipped that he was a “degenerate gambler” by the time was in seventh grade, heading to the track whenever he could.

“Catholic schools get out early every Thursday so we used to go to the track,” he said. “If I was having a bad day, I’d bet my lunch money.”

Hall said he has fond recollections of the years he spent attending Chaminade.

“Chaminade was a good experience, both academically and athletically. I still have a lot of friends there,” he said.

Hall was a student athlete in high school, competing on the school’s swimming team.

“We had a pretty competitive swim team, so it was a good experience,” Hall said.

He said he still goes to Chaminade golf outings and attends an annual retreat house dinner that the school holds.

Although the odds on Ruler on Ice winning the Belmont were 24-1, Hall said he thought the gelding had a good chance to finish in the money, since Ruler on Ice had never failed to finish among the top three horses in its previous races. The horse outran Kentucky Derby winner Animal Kingdom and Preakness Stakes winner Shackleford to reach the winner’s circle.

“I thought we had a good chance being in the top three,” he said, adding that he expected the horse to be among the leaders in the field from the start. Instead, it made its move from the middle of the pack near the end of the race. “As it happened they tried to catch him and he held them off,” Hall said.

Hall, the son of a New York City police officer, grew up in Williston Park and Freeport, where his family moved when he was 12 years old.

Along with being a graduate of Chaminade, Hall also is a graduate of the United States Marine Academy and the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.

He has worked in the investment business for the past 20 years and is president and founder of the Clinton Group, Inc. in New York City.

He is a board member of the New York University School of Medicine Foundation and helped to establish its Head and Neck Cancer Research Laboratory. He was awarded for his efforts with the university’s Sir Harold Acton Medal.

Hall said he’s still considering which races Ruler on Ice will run through the remainder of the racing season. He said he might try to enter the horse in the climactic Breeder’s Cup World Championships in early November at Churchill Downs.

He and his wife Lori first entered the racing business in 2004 when they bought four yearlings for $182,000

He eventually named a horse, Fagan’s Legacy, after his grandfather. Ruler on Ice is named after his seven-year-old son George, a hockey player nicknamed the “ruler on ice” by his mother.

Hall and his wife live with their three children in Rumson, NJ.

Share this Article