Jeff Nisonger guides one of his 4,000-plus winners across the finish line during Tuesday racing at the Shelby County Fair. (Press Pros Feature Photos by Sonny Fulks)
There are those who speak their mind without talent…and talents who keep their thoughts to themselves. Greenville native Jeff Niswonger proves continually that he can do both, with 4,000 wins in his resume’ and an opinion at the ready when it’s necessary.
Sidney, OH — For a guy who says he would never do it again, harness driver Jeff Nisonger is doing it again and again and again.
And then he does it…again!
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A winner of more than 4,000 races, the 45-year-old Nisonger said if given the choice he never would have become a guy who sits on a sulky seat until his posterior turns numb.
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For example, there were 16 races Tuesday at the Shelby County Fairgrounds and Nisonger was behind a filly in all 16 races.
The program consisted of seven races for 2-year-old fillies and nine for 3-year-old fillies and Niswonger jumped from one sulky to another like a man competing in the long jump.
But do it again from the start?
“Probably not,” said the Greenville native who now lives in Lebanon. “That is true. It’s a tough business. You are depending upon an animal to make your living.
‘It doesn’t matter how many hours and how much money you put in ‘em, they are what they are. At the end of the day, even though you want them to be good, they might not be. That’s kinda’ hard to take sometimes.”
But he takes it and does it all as well as anybody around any track, raceway or county fair track.
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“One thing you’ll learn about me – I tell it like it is and tell the truth. I probably wouldn’t do it all over again.”
Honesty? For sure. He was a bit frustrated Tuesday for two reasons.
“This might be the worst track I ever raced on,” he was heard to say after finishing a race early in the day.
“One thing you’ll learn about me,” says the veteran Nisonger. “I tell the truth and I tell it like it is. I probably wouldn’t do this again [if I had the chance].”
And it showed in Race Five when one of the horses Nisonger trains, a beautiful grey filly named Our Grey Heart looked on paper to be the class of the race.
And she might have been better off running on paper than on the miniature gravel pit that is the Shelby County Fairgrounds track.
After all, she had run five races as a 2-year-old and won four and finished second in the other race.
And in her previous race with the big girls at Scioto Downs, she won a $20,000 race.
But on Tuesday she ran third and Niswonger said quickly and quietly, “She was outclassed. Better horses.”
Lest you believe Nisonger was making excuses, why would a personable guy with a perma-press smile who has won more than 4,000 races and followed the starting gate more than 25,000 times need to make excuses.
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Honesty? Nisonger’s policy.
“The track is terrible and they put blankets on the track that scares the horses,” he said. “I’ve told them for years, the horses are terrified by everything. It’s a Winner’s Circle blanket that blows in the wind. The first thing horses want to do is run from everything.”
Amazingly, between the first and second race a horse somehow got loose and was running on the track, naked as the day she was foaled.
Fortunately, she was quickly corraled.
Nisonger reached the 4,000 plateau in career in June at the Putnam County Fair, and has earned $15.25 million in career purses.
On a more positive note, Nisonger recalled his career in equal parts: “I won my 1,000th at Lebanon Raceway, my second thousandth at Scioto, three thousand was at Miami Valley, and 4,000 was at a fair.
It was mid-program in late June at Ottawa, driving Ourcoltofmanycolors, a 3-year-old that covered the distance in 1:59.2.
It was apropos that Nisonger grabbed No. 4,000 on the county fair circuit. He has won his share of races at Scioto, Miami Valley and Dayton, but he prefers racing the young horses on county fair tracks.
‘We fall back on the fairs to regroup and make what we can,” he said. “I actually enjoy the fairs, though. It’s different venues, not the same ol’ monotony all the time like at the raceways.
“At the raceways, it’s more like a job,” he added. “This is more fun. You see different people throughout the year, stuff like that.”
Asked what he would have done with his life if he had not fallen in love with horses, he said, “Military or law enforcement.”
In fact, he was a small town police officer while racing at Lebanon and nearly quit the racing game to dedicate his life to law enforcement.
The bright side of racing…”I make sure I go home to race at Greenville so I can see my family. They all come out to watch.”
“The sport was nearly dead and I was about to get out of it, but the casinos and the slot machines saved the sport.”
Nisonger stuck with it and in 2008 he won 205 races and $858,000 in purses. And now he also trains horses.
Why does he prefer the fairs? Because that’s where 2-year-olds and 3-year-olds prove they can run or prove they can’t run.
“Yeah, that’s what I prefer,” he said. “You have to teach them from the ground up. You are literally breaking them and teaching them everything they know.
“If you do the older horses, the raceway horses, they are already seasoned,” he added. “The two and three year-old years is when they’re learning.
“With the young horses, when you start you can’t even lead them with a rope,” he added. “Then you develop them into winners, it’s reassuring and satisfying to develop them into a winning athlete.”
Asked about his favorite win, he said, “Probably the Partial, the first time at home at Darke County.” That was just his sixth career race while seated behind Bob’s Other Barb.
And Nisonger is partial to Darke County Fairgrounds in Greenville, his home before he left early to horse around in Lebanon.
“I make sure I go home to race at Greenville so I can see my family,” he said. “Yeah, they all come out to watch me.”
It’s like the Andy Landis song: ‘Watch Me Run.’
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