\u2018Storybook life\u2019 of accomplished horse trainer D. Wayne Lukas ends with his death at age 89<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\u201cHe\u2019s as good a friend as I\u2019ve ever had,\u201d Brokopp said. \u201cHe was the best man at my wedding and he\u2019s the godfather of my son Jonathan.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMike was the greatest boss I ever had,\u201d said Marty Mia, who worked in the Sportsman\u2019s press box from 1982-85. \u201cHe was a humble man who\u2019d never do anything to remind you that he was the boss.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was living in Palatine and my car broke down. Mike would come from Rolling Meadows, pick me up and take me to the track and back every single day, and that went on for a week or two until my car was repaired.\u201d<\/p>\n
Retired driver-trainer Carl Porcelli said: \u201cMike was probably the kindest, nicest man I met in the horse business. I\u2019ll never forget what he did when I won the training title at Sportsman\u2019s in 1991. I was only one ahead (going into the final program), so I didn\u2019t tell my family. \u201c<\/p>\n
When Porcelli\u2019s lead became insurmountable that night, Paradise called Porcelli\u2019s wife so she could be there for the winner\u2019s circle presentation honoring him as the leading trainer.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s something I never would have thought to do,\u201d Porcelli said. \u201cI was in shock to see that my family was all there in the winner\u2019s circle.\u201d<\/p>\n
While he is best known for his harness racing endeavors, Paradise also was a thoroughbred publicist par excellence during his years at Sportsman\u2019s.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaxwell G was foaled in 1961 by Indians in Washington, and in 1977 he was 16 years old and at the time thoroughbreds couldn\u2019t race after they were 16,\u201d Brokopp reminisced. \u201cHe was at Sportsman\u2019s and Mike said, \u2018We\u2019ve got to have a party for him.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cThis was Mike at his banging-those-drums PR best. We had a day for Maxwell G with a bushel full of apples in the winner\u2019s circle, and Mike made up a song for him: \u2018Bred in the state of Washington \/ Trained by Richard Hazelton \/ He is the horse for you and me \/ 16-year-old Maxwell G.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
The birthday\/retirement party drew local media attention and then took off nationally. The Wall Street Journal sent a reporter to cover the event.<\/p>\n
Looking back on his long career in 2024, Paradise said one thing he was most proud of was \u201chiring Kim Rinker and Tony Somone and seeing them become important people in harness racing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rinker went to work for Paradise as a writer at Sportsman\u2019s in 1984 and moved with him to Maywood, staying there until 2015. She went on to oversee the Ohio Sire Stakes program for eight years and make a name for herself nationally as a writer for trade publications.<\/p>\n
Somone was hired in 1986 to send Sportsman\u2019s race results and also went with Paradise to Maywood before leaving the PR field for an outside job. However, he stayed active as a harness owner and in 2007 took his current job as the IHHA\u2019s executive director.<\/p>\n
Paradise is survived by his wife of 42 years, Shelly; his daughter, Laura Housman (Jesse); his son, Michael (Diane); his sister, Angel; and five grandchildren. Shelly plans to hold a celebration of his life later this month.<\/p>\n
Neil Milbert is a freelance writer who covered horse racing and other sports during his 40-year career with the Chicago Tribune.<\/p>\n
Originally Published: August 4, 2025 at 1:37 PM CDT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When the Tribune shut down Chicago Today in September 1974, Mike Paradise was one of a select group…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":318533,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4107],"tags":[115704,99225,115705,115702,1071,79,115703,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-318532","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-racing","8":"tag-balmoral-park","9":"tag-harness-racing","10":"tag-maywood-park","11":"tag-mike-paradise","12":"tag-racing","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-sportsmans-park","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114973484477905040","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318532","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=318532"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318532\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/318533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=318532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=318532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=318532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}