That meant Prieto and Juelle were relegated to the bargain basement at a thoroughbred sale where sheiks and oilmen think nothing of laying down millions for a well-bred prospect.

Not surprisingly, most of the colts they purchased were busts, though a couple of the Cubanacan horses, Nucay and Lindero, won a couple small allowance races in California and kept their owners’ hopes alive.

Then, at the 2006 sale, a nice-looking colt by the sire Gilded Time was led into the sales ring. The horse probably would have gone for far more than their budget except that the yearling had suffered a quarter crack — an injury something like a torn fingernail in a human — in his left, rear hoof. Someone, in making a panicky last-minute repair, put a piece of electrical tape on the injury, likely scaring off potential buyers and allowing Juelle and Prieto to pick up the colt for $32,000.

They decided to name their new runner — the 15th horse to race for Cubanacan — after the Galicia region of northern Spain, which was the birthplace of both Prieto’s parents and Magali Juelle’s grandmother. They decided on “Gallego,” the Spanish name for a resident of Galicia, but anglicized it as “Gayego” to make sure that American race callers would get it right.

The horse began to make a name for himself well before he arrived at the track. Monte Schvaneveldt, a member of a longtime California racing clan, told the owners shortly after he broke Gayego that they had something special on their hands.

Once the horse began training at the racetrack, under the tutelage of Paulo Lobo, a transplanted Brazilian horseman based in Southern California, he caught the eye of Hall of Fame jockey Mike Smith, who practically begged Lobo for the mount.

Smith, who won the 2005 Kentucky Derby aboard Giacomo, has been aboard Gayego for all five of his starts, which have resulted in three victories and two second-place finishes. The horse already has earned $723,420 — more than 20 times his purchase price.

As befits two men who trudged through hell before climbing to racing’s heavens, Juelle and Prieto are savoring Gayego’s achievements and expressing gratitude to everyone who has had a hand in his development. They took out a full-page ad this week in the Daily Racing Form thanking Lobo, Smith, bloodstock advisor Suzanne Cardiff, vet Glenna Salyer and others for Gayego’s amazing success and the management at Oaklawn Park and “the entire state of Arkansas” for the hospitality the owners were shown during their recent visit to Hot Springs.

And in conversations with friends, family members and reporters calling to congratulate him on making it to the Derby, Juelle can’t restrain himself when he speaks about his adopted country and the opportunity he was given to work hard and dream big.

“I think God gives you the strength to go through the difficult times,” he told this reporter, shortly before he departed for Kentucky on Tuesday. “And then you think of the beauty of this country that opened their arms to welcome us and … told us, ‘It’s in your hands. How much can you do? How far can you go?’”

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