(LEX 18) — As the countdown to the Kentucky Derby continues, Tom Carpenter is gearing up for something extraordinary: his 60th consecutive Derby.
"It's been a bucket list for me, but 60 times in a row," Tom Carpenter said.
His first trip back in 1967 started as a college road trip and turned into a lifelong tradition.
"It started as a road trip with some of my fraternity friends in University of North Carolina. We decided to take a road trip and after that it's been, haven't missed a year since," Carpenter said.
Carpenter said the Derby experience has evolved, but the excitement never fades.
"It's a sporting event, but it's a social event and it's the only thing I know of that people dress up to go to a sporting event and they really dress up," Carpenter said.
Over the years, he has met legends.
"I got an opportunity to meet Secretariat and see him about six times," Carpenter said.
The tradition also rekindled a childhood love for horses.
"I grew up on a farm, and that's kind of the dream when I got married," Carpenter said.
Now, he and his wife have their own Lexington farm, Meadow Wood Farm.
"We bought it right in the middle of COVID and have done a new barn and fences, and we have raising thoroughbred brood mares and we hope maybe someday to have a horse running on Derby Day," Carpenter said.
Even a pandemic couldn't break his streak. When he couldn't get into Churchill Downs, he watched from a scissor lift across the street.
"We made arrangements to park it right across the street on the back stretch at the Veterans of Foreign War and we were able to go up and down and watch. We could see the finish line. We could see the chute. And we watched the derby from our, what we call, the skybox," Carpenter said.
Now as he prepares for Derby number 60, Carpenter said the experience is something everyone should see at least once.
"I encourage people if they haven't been to get over there and see it in person," Carpenter said.
And if you are going, he has one piece of advice: "You've got to watch the mint juleps," Carpenter said.
