SL Green’s Holliday misses out at Kentucky Derby

SL Green Realty CEO Marc Holliday was unable to replicate his spectacular success in the Manhattan office market at the Kentucky Derby, with his horse Love Train failing to secure a spot on the winner’s podium, the filly’s trainer, Steve Klesaris, told The Real Deal. 

The three-year-old grey filly placed fourth in an undercard race at the Derby, indisputably the biggest event of the U.S. horse racing season.

“We didn’t get as lucky as we’d have liked,” said Klesaris, who has been working with Holliday’s Scarsdale, N.Y.-based Blue Devil Racing Stable for a little over a year. “The break got a little away from us, and she tried hard, but didn’t quite make it.”

In what has become a celebrated part of SL Green’s culture, Holliday took a team of his key executives down to Louisville, Ky., for the Derby, and also invited top commercial brokers such as Eastdil Secured’s Adam Spies.

“We shared the same disappointment,” Klesaris said of Holliday’s reaction to the result.

As of May 1, Blue Devil had claimed six first places, three second places and seven third places in 29 races, according to thoroughbred racing site Equibase.

But Holliday’s fondness for horses certainly isn’t unique in the industry. Jeffrey Gural, the chairman of Newmark Grubb Knight Frank, is another ardent racer who owns two standardbred breeding farms and three racetracks.