Stanco gets his shot in starting gate [Times Union, Albany, N.Y.]

July 20--Ten years ago, Jack Knowlton of Saratoga Springs and his gang of merrymakers from Sackets Harbor turned thoroughbred racing upside down when the upstart gelding named Funny Cide won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness.

At the end of last summer, Don Lucarelli of Duanesburg and his partner Jack Wolf, who owns a house in Saratoga Springs, hooted and hollered when a 2-year-old colt named Shanghai Bobby was named the best juvenile in the nation.

And now, here is another local man ready to join the fraternity of successful Capital Region horse owners. Well, Ed Stanco is sort of local.

He grew up in Schenectady and graduated from Linton High School in 1967. He left the area for good in 1979. Now, he's settled in New Jersey, where he is the CEO of the Toa Reinsurance Company of America.

He is back home this weekend and hoping to find Grade I gold at Saratoga Race Course. Stanco is the owner of a 3-year-old filly named Princess of Sylmar. A couple of months ago, she shocked a crowd of more than 100,000 at Churchill Downs in Kentucky when she won the prestigious Kentucky Oaks the day before the Kentucky Derby was run.

Princess of Sylmar's odds that day were an eye-popping 38-1.

The Princess hasn't run since, but she will be out to show it was not a fluke when she takes her place in the starting gate Saturday for the $300,000 Coaching Club America Oaks, the first big race of the Saratoga season.

Ed Stanco and 120 of his closest friends will be right in the middle of the steamy Saratoga clubhouse hoping to be going a little crazy at around 6 Saturday night.

"It has always been the long-term goal, the life dream," Stanco said this past week. "If we can pull it off ... it would just be so great."

"It," of course, is winning a big, big race at Saratoga. If Princess Sylmar, who is the 9-5 morning-line favorite, does this, she then likely will advance to the Alabama Stakes, the pinnacle race for 3-year-old fillies at the Spa.

Dreams like this have been with Stanco ever since he was a kid, when he and his younger brother, Roger, would tag along with their Uncle Phil for trips to the harness track.

Stanco got interested in buying racehorses in 1995, and he has run some at Saratoga. He won a couple times at the Spa with New York breds. A horse named Capeside Lady broke her maiden here in 2003, as did a filly named Storm Dixie in 2006.

"We all went to Longfellow's to celebrate," Stanco said. "We had quite a party. I think we spent all the purse money."

Storm Dixie later became the dam of Princess of Sylmar.

"Ed was really excited about her long before the Oaks," trainer Todd Pletcher said. "That win really took it to another level. That is what is great about this industry. You can take a guy like Ed, and this is the first horse he has ever bred from a modestly priced mare, and you get the Kentucky Oaks winner while competing with some of the richest people in the world."

Win or lose this race, there will be some kind of celebration for Stanco and his 120 friends, some from Jersey, some from up here. Stanco said he has rented a house in Saratoga for the meet, and there never really was a party after the upset Kentucky Oaks win.

"You really can't script this," said Stanco, who hasn't slept much in the past few weeks as the Spa excitement got to him. "Sometimes, I just have to pinch myself."

twilkin@timesunion.com, 518-454-5415, @tjwilkin

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