by Rich Fisher, USTA Web Newsroom Senior Correspondent

Rich Fisher

Trenton, NJ — Earlier this week, a post on Perry Soderberg’s Twitter page said “My horse Rocky Mountain Guy won at the Big M tonight, great job by everyone involved!”

At least one of those involved could not be more thankful for the opportunity to help — trainer Nancy Johansson.

The 31-year-old daughter of Hall of Fame trainer Jimmy Takter and wife of driver Marcus Johansson, Nancy broke off on her own last fall and needed someone to take a chance on her. Soderberg, who has known Nancy since she was 2 and is godfather to the Johanssons’ daughter Ella, gave her just that chance when he let her train a 3-year-old pacing gelding he bought in January.

USTA/Mark Halll photo

Nancy Johansson is currently training five horses at Joie De Vie Farms in New Jersey.

“I called him and asked if I could train the horse for him and it started rolling from there,” Johansson said. “I’ve always wanted to do it, but it’s hard being a woman. It’s always a handicap. And being Jimmy Takter’s daughter doesn’t help sometimes because you’re in his shadow.”

But Soderberg was willing to give her a shot and when he purchased Rocky Mountain Guy at the Meadowlands January Select Mixed Sale, he gave Nancy the lines.

“Perry does all the recruiting for my dad; he looks at yearlings and helps my dad pick out the horses and he’s very respected at doing that,” Johansson said. “Perry had Rocky Mountain Guy on his list of horses, he was going there to purchase the horse and we had a few on our list, but I felt Rocky Mountain was the one we would get the most of, and he had him on his radar.

“What I’m really looking for is somebody to give me a shot and I’m very thankful Perry Soderberg has given me the chance to do what I want to do. I’m hoping somebody else out there will feel the same way.”

While it would seem to be a slam dunk that an owner might want a Takter offspring handling their horse, Nancy says there are pros and cons to being the daughter of a legendary trainer.

“In the ways it helps me is, I think that you’re born with a natural gift to train horses,” she said. “My dad obviously has the gift. You have to be able to communicate with the horse and make the right calls, and I feel I have that.

“I think he would agree with that. When he was working with us, he would listen to my suggestions and I learned a lot from him working there. I tell people that from going to my dad’s ‘school’ I got a PhD in training. I just have to take the stuff I learned and do it on my own and I feel now is the time.”

But then there is the drawback of having the Takter name to live up to.

“Where it might be a negative, is that people assume that either you’ve got an owner that has tons of money and wants to put a horse in training, but they would rather put it in training with my dad than give me a chance,” Johansson said. “Obviously he’s a hall of famer. He runs a class act operation and it’s hard to be in that shadow a little. Other people might expect a lot of me, but I expect a lot of myself too.

“I love taking care of horses and I loved working for my dad. But at some point I knew I could do it. I just needed to do it, needed to prove it to myself that I could do it.”

And Rocky Mountain Guy’s win last Saturday with driver Andy Miller provided the proof she needed, as the victory was the highlight of Johansson’s fledgling solo career. So far this year, Johansson has three wins in nine starts, good for $16,935 in purses.

USTA/Mark Hall photo

Nancy Johansson has three training wins in just nine starts this year.

“He won in (1):52.2,” she said. “I feel like we’ve done a good job with that horse and getting him where he’s at. He’s got the (New Jersey) Sire Stakes at the Meadowlands so hopefully he’ll continue. He showed some potential as a 2-year-old; he won his division of the Reynolds at the Meadowlands. Hopefully he’ll unfold to be a nice caliber horse.”

Another highlight for Nancy came when her brother, Jimmy Takter, Jr., better known as J.J., drove Road Rash, one of the five horses in her stable, to a win at Freehold. He got his ‘A’ license in the process.

“I told him ‘Don’t say I never gave you anything,’” Johansson said with a laugh. “He’s very talented; he’s in the same situation I was in for a long time. He needs somebody to give him a shot.

“Everybody thinks he’s Takter’s son, he will drive Takter’s horses. But the success J.J. and I have doesn’t come from the fact my dad has horses. You still need to do the work. Of course J.J. drives a lot of nice horses working for my dad, but he has talent and he can do it on his own too.”

Nancy and Marcus have five horses in training at Joie De Vie Farms in Jobstown, N.J., but she doesn’t want to go much higher than that.

“I’d like to have around eight, but no more than 10,” she said. “I like to do things myself. I’m not really good at delegating. My dad is very hands-on too. My husband always says I’m the female version of my dad. Hopefully that turns out to be true.

“But I like things done my way; I want certain details paid attention to. If you get too many horses, you have too much going on and you lose a little of that. I’d like to have more of a boutique stable than a Wal-Mart stable.”

One of the advantages Nancy has, is that Marcus understands her hands-on approach and picks his spots when providing input.

“It’s good working with Marcus,” she said. “Marcus has a lot of good insight and worked for my dad too. The best thing I like about working with Marcus is he does listen to me and lets me make decisions. Sometimes it’s hard for husbands to let wives make a decision, but he says ‘You’re doing the training.’”

And judging by the early reviews, she’s doing it quite well.