Audrey Cheung finding great success as a trainer at Woodbine this year despite her partner suffering a stroke

By STEVE BUFFERY

Audrey Cheung’s first year as a head trainer at Woodbine has sort of mirrored that of a boxer in a championship bout. She suffered a knockdown, climbed back on to her feet and is back in the fight, winning.

“I’m very grateful for the opportunities and experiences that I’ve had this year,” said Cheung. “There’s been a lot of firsts in a lot of good ways - our first wins, first as an owner too. I’m just really grateful for the opportunities the owners have given me, that I get to work with some nice horses. It’s been fun … well, most of it.”

In her first year as a head trainer - after working as an assistant to Martin Drexler for the last few seasons - Cheung has recorded 15 victories with eight seconds and 12 thirds in 56 starts, her horses finishing in the money an impressive 62% of the time. She’s also won three Stakes contests, including the $125,000 Sophomore Stakes last Saturday at Woodbine with the three-year-old dark bay gelding My Covenant - his third straight victory and second consecutive stakes score, My Covenant also won the Lake Erie Stakes on Sept.7. Bred in Ontario by Tucci Holdings and owned by Mad Dog Racing Stables LLC and former National Hockey League player Mike Robitaille, My Covenant (Souper Speedy – Dilly Dally Darby, by Old Forester) was claimed by the owners for $25,000 last fall. The Sophomore win improved My Covenant's record to 4-2-3 from 10 lifetime starts.

“I wanted to keep my owners happy and obviously winning races is part of that,” said Cheung, when asked if she had set any particular goals coming into the 2026 season. “Realistically, I was probably happy with about five wins this year and we’re at 15. So, it’s already gone way above my expectations.”

Her first season in charge of her own barn had been almost magical if not for a massive, life-changing experience that occurred a few weeks ago when her partner (on the track and off) Phil Hyde, suffered a massive stroke while working at Woodbine. Thankfully, the veteran horseman is recovering in hospital. In fact, it was Hyde who encouraged Cheung to talk to a writer from the HBPA.

“He’s the one who told me to make sure to talk to you. Because I was ready to skip it,” said Cheung, on the phone from Etobicoke General Hospital. “But he said, ‘No, you talk to him.’”

Hyde, who works the gates at Ajax Downs and Fort Erie when not assisting Cheung at Woodbine, suffered an accident in the gate at the Fort a couple of weeks before his stroke, though Cheung said it had nothing to do with his stroke.

“He swore he never hit his head, they never checked him out for it,” she said. “He got sort of knocked on the chin, a horse went up on the gate on him. But (the doctors) don’t think that’s the cause of the bleed. The bleed was pretty deep in his brain and it wasn’t from trauma.”

Cheung, who visits Hyde every day after her work at Woodbine is done, said her partner is recovering “slowly, but surely.”

“He’s awake and he can talk,” she said. “But his left side is too weak to get out of bed. We’re just starting physio and he’ll get there.”

When Cheung says, “he’ll get there”, what she really means is “we’ll get there” as they really are a team.

“It’s great to work with someone that you love,” Cheung said. “It takes a lot to live and work together and we are a very good team, a very strong team.”

Cheung and Hyde both worked for Drexler before Woodbine’s second-leading trainer in wins last year decided to step away from racing in 2026, mainly for financial reasons. Cheung decided to break out on her own as a head trainer and she and Hyde had been rolling along quite nicely this year.

“Obviously, this has been a bit of a bump in the road with Phil in the hospital. This winter we had on planned on going to Florida and the owners were ready to send the horses with us. But we’ll take the winter off now and help Phil get stronger and re-start next year.

“In terms of goals, long-term, it’s sort of hard to think about that right now because I feel like when I make plans they’re not working out,” Cheung said, her voice cracking with emotion. “So just one step at a time. I just want to get back to it with Phil. That’s my big thing. It’s OUR thing. I don’t want to do this without him. We’ll re-group next year and start again and continue to have success.”

Cheung’s journey to becoming a trainer at Woodbine has been a circuitous one to say the least. Born and raised in Richmond Hill to a non-horse racing family, Cheung fell in love with horses after her mom signed her up for riding lessons, along with her sister, when she was seven.

“After high school, I went to university but I was always working with mostly show horses at farms. Someone had race horses at a farm and I started learning to gallop them and after I was done with school, I wanted a break and ended up at the track and just never left,” said Cheung.

“So, I have a chemical engineering degree sitting somewhere in my sister’s basement,” she added with a laugh.

Not exactly the career route her parents expected her to take.

“They just want me to be happy,” said Cheung.  “They would always support me anyway. It’s not their world at all and the race track is very much a world of its own, but they are very supportive.”

Cheung had worked for trainers Pat Parente, Carolyn Costigan and Bill Tharrenos at Woodbine before being hired by Drexler.

“Marty gave me a lot of opportunities to work with some very nice horses, gave me a lot of independence and freedom to learn from them,” she said.

She also learned that, no matter how much success a trainer may have, it’s very difficult making a living as a thoroughbred trainer in Canada.

“We are very hands-on ourselves and that’s really the only way to do it to make any kind of money right now, as I’m sure any trainer can tell you,” said Cheung, who exercises her own horses. “We really do all of it ourselves. We had just one hot walker with us and we would both groom, I ride, and we just do all the barn stuff ourselves.”

Cheung said that trainers Nigel Burke and Denise McCachrie have both helped out this year with Hyde recovering.

“When asked what the biggest thrill has been for her on the track so far this season, Cheung said her nine-year-old dark bay gelding Alley Oop Johnny winning her first ever race as a head trainer on May 23 at Woodbine was a definite highlight.

“Alley Oop Johnny winning meant a lot because I own the horse,” said Cheung. “He’s a project. He’s not an easy horse. Phil loves that horse. That is Phil’s favorite horse for years, even when Marty had him. So, it meant a lot that he got to win under my name. And it was our work. That meant more than any win this year. And then to have him come back win a second race (on June 12) … it may have been for $10,000 but he hadn’t won for two years before that and just to have him cross the line first … those two wins meant the most and will always mean the most.”

“Yes, he was running for $10,000, but that’s where he belonged and that’s part of training - picking the right race where he could win. And he has to be happy when he’s running,” said Cheung. “He’s a little bit of a quirky horse. We put a lot of work into him. We took him to Florida this winter, which is not cheap, but he ran a couple of seconds there and paid for himself that way. It was pretty cool that he finally won for us under my name here.

“He just decides when he wants to run and when he doesn’t want to run sometimes,” added Cheung, with a laugh. “He’s more worried about goofing around, looking around. Even as a nine-year-old, he still wants to look at the grandstand or wait for other horses. He’s not that focussed all the time. He’s a funny one. Romero Maragh rode him for us in those two wins and he did a really good job keeping him focussed.”

Alley Oop Johnny was claimed by Jim Ensom and then Pat Parente this year and, because he’s a nine-year-old, this will be his final season racing at Woodbine.

“I want to reach out to Pat and just ask if I can buy him and retire him. I don’t want to keep him as a riding horse myself, but I would find him a home and I hope they decide to retire him as well instead of sending him to a cheap track,” said Cheung.