Life can take unexpected twists. Chris Dragone, the new president and general manager of the Maryland Jockey Club, knows that for sure.

His latest came about two months ago when Magna CEO Frank Stronach called and asked whether he would come back to Maryland, where he had been general manager for eight months in 2006 before leaving to become the executive director of New York Thoroughbred Breeders Inc.

Dragone had left Magna because he thought he wanted a new challenge, but soon realized he missed running the operations of a racetrack.

So, when Stronach called, Dragone said yes.

Now, here he is in his new office at Laurel Park, contemplating what it means to be back.

"My family has been involved in horse racing for 42 years," Dragone, 49, said. "It started with my dad, and I've been around it since I was 8, and I always wanted to get to a level to manage a track."

This is his chance. But it means uprooting his family. He has been living alone in a hotel and expects to move into an apartment soon until he and his wife, Shawna, find a farm here where they can settle with their brood: Deuce, a Lab; Tilly, a border terrier; Chet, a beagle mix; their barn cat, Bugger, and their four broodmares. The mares are currently spread around in Kentucky and New York.

Shawna and the dogs and cat are still in Saratoga, N.Y., where Dragone has a house that has been in his family for 30 years and probably always will be.

In the horse-racing world, Shawna is known as Shawna Barber, a former jockey who still works as an exercise rider. But she is also known in the ice skating world as a figure skater who is training to make it to the adult national championships in Lake Placid, N.Y., April 9-12.

Dragone was pretty stationary the first 13 years of his career, working at the Meadowlands and then Monmouth Park, where he advanced to assistant GM.

After that, he joined Magna and saw the country: Michigan for two years, Portland for two years, then his eight months in Maryland before deciding to settle in Saratoga, working with the breeders' organization.

"Through all that, you're looking for a place where you can get a farm and settle down," he said. "There are not many places that can come close to the Maryland job. Once you get this job, you stop looking. Because of that, I hope to help Maryland racing improve."

Dragone has come to Maryland at a time when the state's horse racing industry is itself unsettled. To keep the race cards competitive, Dragone's predecessor, Lou Raffetto, and the horsemen had to agree to cut purses, races and days.

The most startling cut was that of the $500,000, Grade I Pimlico Special. That race, which drew some of the best horses in the country over seven decades, including War Admiral, Seabiscuit, Citation, Cigar and Real Quiet, was eliminated last year. If it does not return to the Maryland racing card this May, it will lose graded status, a key element in major league racing.

"The Pimlico Special is a priority for me because I think it is one of the foundations for the Preakness weekend," Dragone said. "If we want to continue to grow the Preakness Festival, meaning the Friday and Saturday, then we need the Pimlico Special there."

He is looking for someone to sponsor the race at its lowest possible purse, $250,000.

Maryland Racing Commission chairman John Franzone doesn't like that route. "In today's world, a $250,000 purse loses allure for the big horses," he said. "To get the Pimlico Special back with its past prestige intact, it would take a purse of $750,000 to $1 million."

But Dragone said the first priority is getting the race back on the schedule - then he can work on building the purse. Right now, he's strapped for cash, and so are Maryland's horsemen, who asked Raffetto to cancel the Pimlico Special so its purse money could help subsidize daily racing cards.

"We're running four days a week now because we can't fund a fifth day," said Wayne Wright, executive secretary of the Maryland Thoroughbred Horsemen's Association. "We're in survival mode. If you can't fund a fifth day, you're not going to go, 'Yahoo!' when it is suggested you could put $500,000 in a single purse for the Pimlico Special. It's not good business."

But Wright made it clear he was not saying he does not want the race, only that the MTHA can't afford it.

"I'm a fan," he said. "There is nothing more exciting than a good, quality field of top runners. ... So, I hope he has success in finding a sponsor for it."

So does Dragone, who has a plate overflowing with questions and few ready answers.

"There are a lot of challenges, but that's part of the job," he said. "If you've always wanted to work at the racetrack and manage a racetrack, I think this is the place you want to be.

"You have very deep traditions that no other state has, including New York. The sport here goes back to before the Revolutionary War. And there is a passion here I haven't seen anywhere else - beauty, fine horsemen, tradition. I don't know what else you can be looking for."

Money?

Dragone smiled.

"It only goes so far," he said. "I simply love horse racing."

sandra.mckee@baltsun.com