Frank Calvarese, revered NYRA starting-gate master, dies at 96

Frank Calvarese spent decades in one of racing’s most pressure-packed jobs, and at New York tracks he became the man trainers trusted when a field broke from the gate. The longtime starting-gate official died Thursday, May 1, at his home in West Palm Beach, Florida, at 96 after a period of declining health and heart failure.

Calvarese’s path through the sport began in 1955 on the gate crew at Delaware Park, the same year the New York Racing Association was established to oversee New York’s major Thoroughbred tracks. By 1984, he had risen to head starter at the NYRA circuits, a post he held through 1993. In a game where a restless horse or a late break can alter a race in seconds, Calvarese built a reputation on calm authority, horse sense and the kind of steady judgment that kept jockeys, trainers and officials aligned before the first stride.

His reach extended well beyond routine race days. As an assistant starter, Calvarese handled Secretariat and Ruffian, two horses whose names still define an era of American racing. Ruffian’s breakdown on July 6, 1975, in a match race against Foolish Pleasure at Belmont Park remains one of the sport’s most painful memories. Ruffian entered that race undefeated in eight starts and had already become one of racing’s biggest stars, which made the loss even more devastating for a sport that was still reckoning with its public image.

The line of succession at NYRA also ran through Calvarese. Bob Duncan, who began working at NYRA tracks in 1967-68 and later returned from Army service in Korea, became Calvarese’s assistant starter before succeeding him in 1993 as head starter. Duncan held that job until his retirement in 2004, a handoff that underscored how deeply Calvarese shaped the next generation of gate leadership. He had worked under George Cassidy and remained close with trainers including Frank Martin and Allen Jerkens, relationships that reflected both his seriousness and his toughness, as his wife, Lisa, recalled.

Calvarese’s death removes one of the last direct links to an earlier New York racing era, when the starting gate was not background machinery but a central guardrail for safety, fairness and race integrity. For nearly four decades, he helped make sure the most vulnerable moment in a race, the break from the gate, held up under pressure.