Among them are: social media coordinator for and , U.S. assistant racing manager at AMO Racing, graduate and all-female camel racing winner.

It’s easy to wonder what led Leslie from the Bluegrass State’s horse tracks to camel racing in Dubai. This week, she’s back in Louisville providing professional social media coverage of the Run for the Roses. ��

UofL News caught up with the accomplished alumna to hear more about her journey and the influence of the university.����

UofL News: What initially sparked your interest in the Equine Industry Business Program at UofL?��

Leslie: I was intrigued by the program because there isn’t anything else like it. Being able to get a business degree while specializing in the equine field was something that really drew me in. I also liked that it was a very close-knit program and the class sizes were small.��

UofL News: Can you share with us the journey that led you from studying equine business at the University of Louisville to becoming involved in camel racing and eventually winning the C1 Championship in Dubai?��

Leslie: I worked in the Thoroughbred industry throughout college and took every opportunity to meet new people. Working for Thoroughbred racehorse trainer Mark Casse, I met a lot of connected people who had an influence on where I am today. In 2022, I went to Dubai for America’s Best Racing and it was then that I was first introduced to camel racing. I went out to film a segment on unique things to do in Dubai at the only camel riding school in the UAE, and that is where I met Linda Krockenberger, who co-founded the school and started the C1 Championships. We joked that it would be cool for me to one day compete in a race, and little did we know it would lead to this. Two years later the dream became a reality, and it turned out better than we both could have imagined.��

UofL News: Do you have any memorable experiences or lessons from your time as a student at the University of Louisville that have stuck with you since graduating?��

Leslie: I enjoyed meeting students with similar passions, even if we weren’t focused on the same discipline – we all shared the love for the horse. I really enjoyed my time on the UofL Saddleseat Team, in which we took home the national title. I have had a passion for horses since I can remember, but being surrounded by like-minded people on a daily basis certainly helped ignite my dream of working in the Thoroughbred industry. Terri Burch welcomed me into the program with open arms and for that, I’m forever grateful.��

UofL News: Have you ever participated in any Kentucky Derby events or festivities? Did the university’s proximity and ties to Churchill Downs help your career?��

Leslie: Yes, I was very lucky to work for Mark Casse when we had several horses competing in the Derby. War of Will in 2019 (who went on to win the Preakness Stakes), Enforceable in 2020 and Soup and Sandwich and Helium in 2021.��

I was at the track every morning before heading to school, so being nearby was ideal, especially when my alarm went off at 4:30 each morning. I had to have a nap every day in between classes, but the hard work definitely paid off.��

UofL News: What advice would you offer to prospective or current students in the Equine Industry Business Program at UofL who may be considering various career paths within the industry?��

Leslie: Take every opportunity. Even if you feel as though the event, person or whatever it may be might not benefit you, you never know who you’ll meet. I exhausted myself, but it was the best thing I could have done for my career. If I hadn’t jumped at every opportunity, I wouldn’t be in the position I am today. I never gave up, and I knew that going to college while working and traveling wouldn’t be easy, but I was lucky to have a support system that helped me follow my dreams.��

Arguably, the deepest tie is the music – the auditory traditions that evoke emotion and pageantry throughout the city on that first Saturday each May. Indeed, if an official soundtrack existed for the Kentucky Derby, the University of Louisville would appear several times in the credits.

Take, for instance, the event’s signature opening of “My Old Kentucky Home.”

The rendition is performed by our very own Marching Cards. It has been since 1936, in fact, when the group was first recognized as “The Official Band of the Kentucky Derby.” The lyrics, meanwhile, are brought to life by the UofL Cardinal Singers.

A few years ago, a�� experience is like: “I’ve interviewed Kentuckians who haven’t set foot in the state for 30 years who still stand in front of their televisions and weep when they hear the woodwinds and brass instruments strike the first few notes of ‘My Old Kentucky Home.’ The lyrics tell us that there’ll be hard times, by and by. But at the crescendo, it’s as if 150,000 voices nudge us to weep no more.”��

Those are our students playing those woodwinds and brass instruments and��creating such sentiment, courtesy of Stephen Collins Foster’s lyrics. Such an experience is not lost on the group.

“I’m extremely proud to be a part of this tradition. Some of the most important work the CMB does is that which impacts the Louisville community. To represent not only the city, but the state at such a highly respected sporting event is truly humbling. Further, this experience creates a unique bond between current and former members of the CMB that no other marching band can relate to. Like the rest of the band, my memory of this Derby will last a lifetime,” said Michael LaRoche, a Marching Card and mechanical engineering major.

“Hands down my favorite part is hearing everyone sing at Churchill Downs. When the song begins, voices are a bit subdued, but then a strong rise of voices is heard on ‘Weep no more my lady.’ It is a powerful and unifying event that makes you feel connected to people all over the world and so proud to live in Kentucky,” Amy Acklin, director of the Cardinal Marching Band, said in 2019.

So important is this tradition to our students that when the Derby was canceled in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, UofL drum major Natalie Humble recruited marching band students from schools across the state to record a virtual version of “My Old Kentucky Home.”

Meanwhile, that emotion shifts to excitement whenever the sound of the trumpet rises above the crowd to beckon horses to the starting gate for each race. The signature “Call to the Post” has been used at racetracks since the 1860s, . At the Derby, it’s performed by UofL School of Music alum Steve Buttleman, who earned a bachelor’s degree in music performance in 2007.

The fulltime bugler, who also kicks off the day with “The Star-Spangled Banner,” performs at hundreds of special events throughout the year. But it’s his Derby assignment that stands out most.

“There isn’t another office in the world with a view like mine. I step out onto the balcony and I am looking across the racetrack at the Twin Spires … I never take what I do for granted,” he told the Courier Journal.

Derby Week is here, which means our city is in the spotlight of a global stage once again. And positioned in that metaphoric orchestra pit, ready to set the tone for the festivities, are our fellow Cardinals. , for a Marching Cards takeover from��LaRoche.

Check out a performance from the Marching Cards and the Cardinal Singers from a few years ago:

In 2017, his research yielded an interesting discovery: When American whiskey is diluted with water, it creates what he has termed “whiskey webs.” Read more below.

UofL News:��How did you become interested in “whiskey webs?” What is a whiskey web?

Williams: My great uncle worked for Brown-Forman distillery and, when I was a young professor looking at all the avenues of research, I reached out to Brown-Forman and learned that there were colloids in bourbon. When I went on sabbatical in 2017 at North Carolina State, I took a case of bourbon to study its colloid science. We were motivated by a Harvard study where they evaporated Scotch droplets onto a slide, where it formed a uniform film.

For our experiment, we took whiskey at about 45% alcohol by volume (ABV) and diluted it with water to 20% ABV and evaporated it. We discovered, by accident, that the resulting patterns looked like webs, nothing like the Scotch results. We liked the term whiskey webs to describe this result and decided to investigate the governing colloid science. We wondered if you could differentiate different bourbons through investigating their whiskey web patterns. Could it be used as a counterfeit measure or for quality control?

UofL News: How is this both an art and a science?

Williams: It crosses different thresholds. If you show people a picture of a whiskey web, they’re drawn to it, it has vibrant color and nice contrast. When you tell them it’s a whiskey droplet, they’re intrigued and can’t just walk away. They want to know more. One of our whiskey webs was actually accepted into an art gallery in Texas in 2019 and it won the visitor’s award because people were so intrigued by it. Once people are interested, then they want to know how it formed. They ask, “What’s the science behind it?” It’s nice that it crosses all those boundaries and produces a nice story when everything is brought together.

UofL News: Is it possible to identify different brands of whiskey by their webs?

Williams: Yes, but the caveat is that it’s sensitive to a fault. We found out that if the humidity changes in the lab, or if we change our water source, the pattern changes. We are working on ways of making this test robust enough to generate a consistent library, for example, such that Buffalo Trace always looks like this. Can we do it? Yes. Is it feasible to do it? Perhaps. We would have to have very precise controls in order to say “yes” to your question. We are still working on ways to make it more robust.

UofL News: What is your favorite whiskey web and why?

Williams: I am intrigued by Pappy Van Winkle. It’s a sample where I have different ages – 10, 20 year variations so it gives me a way to compare and contrast. What we’ve noticed is that Pappy is one that has webs in the middle but not on the perimeter. We’ve noticed with some of our other 20-yr bourbons that the patterns only form on the interior. Why is that? What’s going on in the physics that gives us indication of age? It’s a web that looks neat, too, but at the same time there’s a science-driven reason behind it.

UofL News: What research applications and new knowledge do you expect to glean from this study?

Williams: With whiskey webs, we consider it an engineering problem we are actively pursuing to get to that identification and characterization stage. One possible research application is quality control.

Will this replace high tech applications like liquid chromatography that can really get down to the molecular level? No, but once we get that portable robust testing methodology panned out – could it be used for a quick drop quality control? I think so. From a counterfeit perspective, it might work to tell us if it is bourbon or not. You could take moonshine and add colorant and call it bourbon, but we have found if it is not a bourbon, it won’t create a web.�� Using the physics that guide this, can we apply it to other things besides whiskey? We are looking at that.

People are interested in creating a whiskey web for their personal favorites so we’re also working to develop an at-home kit. The challenge is to get the light just right, and not everyone has access to highly filtered water. While you need a microscope to get a really good artistic image, you can actually visualize a web with your smart phone at home. We have a kit that can make that happen.

UofL News: What’s next?

Williams: Doing outreach and education on this has been great. Whiskey webs was one of the display projects in Washington, DC in spring of 2019 selected to present to the Smithsonian. 60,000 people viewed it at the ACCelerate Festival.�� Outside of Kentucky, most people don’t know what bourbon is. They think it’s just whiskey, so it’s great educating the public on what bourbon is. The difference, in case you don’t know, is American whiskeys, inclusive of bourbon are aged in newly charred, never used, oak barrels. Whiskey webs form for any American whiskey, so for us at least it’s that new barrel that is the key to making these structures from what we’ve studied so far. (In addition, bourbon specifically, as opposed to other whiskeys, is made from a majority of corn in the grains within its mash.)

This makes for a nice evolving conversation with interested viewers – this is bourbon, this is colloid science, this is how things evaporate. We enjoy telling that narrative to whoever is willing to listen. Once the pandemic allows, we are willing to go to different local and regional events to have people talk about science, talk about bourbon, talk about art, all of the above.

That’s one thing we’re excited about and looking forward to doing in the future, as well as, of course generating proposals and scientific ideas and trying to get the fundamental science going at the same time.

Read the full article on the .��

The program is celebrating its 30^th anniversary this year. Students who complete the program graduate with a business degree, making the program the only AACSB International-accredited business degree in the world with an equine major.

“This is unique, as most colleges and universities that offer horse programs are in the agricultural department. The basic classes are geared toward science disciplines,” said Terri Burch, program coordinator and faculty member, who has been with the program since it began in 1987. “Our program is a business degree with specialized equine business classes developed in-house. Parents love that about our program.”

It means that in a business that is as cyclic as the horse business, which ebbs and flows with the health of the economy, UofL equine graduates can always find a job, even if it is in another industry.

“Agricultural degrees are not as versatile,” Burch said.

About half the students in the program are Kentucky residents, she said, and it attracts international attention. Students from as far away as China have studied in��the program.

Equine students often work at Churchill Downs in various roles and to be sure, the track will be filled with students, faculty and alumni of the program during Derby 2017. If you’re looking for equine student Leah Vasquez on Oaks and Derby weekend, she will be with Dale Romans, trainer of J Boys Echo. She has been working as a photographer for Romans, handling some of his social media accounts.

Last year, equine grad Jack Sisterson was working as an assistant trainer to Doug O’Neill, who trained Kentucky Derby winner Nyquist. He also worked with O’Neill in 2012 when they conditioned Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner I’ll Have Another. ��In 2015, equine student Megan Riddle worked with NBC on Triple Crown and Breeders Cup coverage, getting the chance of a lifetime to watch American Pharoah win all four races and become the first horse to win American horse racing’s Grand Slam, as well as the first Triple Crown winner since 1978.

Equine grad Andre Stock was an assistant to trainer Larry Jones when Jones had two Kentucky Oaks winners – Believe You Can in 2012 and Lovely Maria in 2015.

Equine alumni can be found in almost every horse industry nook and cranny. Besides Churchill Downs, they’ve been scooped up by Keeneland, Santa Anita Park, California Thoroughbred Breeders Association, Jockeys Guild, TwinSpires.com, WinStar Farm, Hermitage Farm, Carousel Horse Farm, Stone Place Farm, Roberts Communications Network and Paulick Report, just to name a few.

A niche industry filled with nuances

One graduate, Sean Beirne, is chairman of the Colorado Racing Commission and also works for Roberts Communications Network. Beirne returned to Louisville earlier this year to guest teach a class on issues in the equine industry.

“I wouldn’t be where I am if it weren’t for the equine program,” said Beirne, who said a business background is absolutely essential for success in an industry that has become entirely focused on financial prowess.

“That’s where these guys have the advantage over their counterparts,” he said.

But the program also opened doors for him. He learned to call races during his internship at River Downs, and went on to call 12,000 races during his early career.

“You know, you make these connections and … you have to run with the ball after you get it, but a lot of that I owe to this school,” he said. “And I’ve always wanted to come back here and speak to the students.”

He said students of the program receive an education that is specialized in what is a niche industry filled with nuances. One of the issues he still deals with as racing commissioner is that of horses racing on medication. “You know, I remember writing that paper” as a student in 1988, he laughed.

The equine program has graduated 305 students since 1989, when the first – and at the time only – graduate earned the degree. 2012 saw the most equine graduates with 21.

Burch said the horse industry has changed as technology has advanced in the last three decades.

��“We’ve witnessed the introduction of telephone wagering, off-track betting and simulcasting, the formation of ��… ‘racinos’ (race tracks combined with casinos), shuttering of racetracks, surface innovations, after-care market expansion … historical betting machines, Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, etc.,” she said. Other industry-changing events have been the advancement of “super purses” (very large purses paid out after a race) and events such as the Pegasus and Dubai world cups.

In every case, the program has kept up with the changes to give the students their best chance at breaking into the industry.

Although there is no riding component to the program, UofL has four equine sports teams that many of the students participate in – hunt seat, western, saddle seat and polo. A new team, eventing, starts this fall. The teams are run by students who elect officers, hold meetings and raise their own money. UofL has partnerships with four stables that allow students to either board their own horses or ride the stables’ horses for lessons, practice and competitions.

The family-like atmosphere among the students, faculty and staff of the program, located in the west wing of the College of Business, was sadly evident in late April following the death of Tim Capps, an industry heavyweight who had been the program’s director since 2011. Capps, 71, had been hospitalized since mid-February following a stroke.

His death was widely reported in horse trade industry publications, and the College of Business .

This annual celebration of cancer survivorship��kicks off at 3:30 p.m. at the Kosair Charities Clinical and Translational Research Building, 505 S. Hancock St.

The party will be emceed by Miss America 2000 and Miss Louisville and Miss Kentucky 1999 Heather French Henry and feature musical entertainment, food and a tribute to all survivors of cancer and their caregivers. An added component this year will be a Salute to Veterans of the Armed Forces.

Following the party, survivors wishing to attend the 2017 Pegasus Parade will be escorted to special seating on East Broadway to view the parade.

This year’s theme is theme is “Party for the Pegasus Parade.”��

Below is a preview of the parade:��

Though Medals4Mettle (M4M) is an international organization, the UofL School of Medicine M4M program is unique in that the students have the opportunity to meet with their buddies prior to the race and personally present their medals to them after running. This year, 87 medical students will participate. On the Thursday prior to Derby each year, the Kentucky Cancer Program at UofL hosts a Cancer Survivors Celebration at the Kosair Charities Clinical & Translational Research Building. After the celebration, survivors walk to Broadway together to attend the annual Pegasus Parade. from last year’s event, including comments from UofL President James Ramsey.

This year, UofL basketball players Damion Lee and Trey Lewis, both graduate transfers who played for the Cardinals this season, will serve as honorary grand marshals for the annual Pegasus Parade, which marches down Broadway on May 5 beginning at 5 p.m. The parade in past has included UofL-affiliated grand marshals such as coach Rick Pitino, the 2013 Men’s and Women’s basketball teams, and NFL quarterback Teddy Bridgewater, a former UofL quarterback.

Also this year, the 2016 Kentucky Derby Queen, , is a junior at UofL majoring in Business Finance. She is joined on the Royal Court by another UofL student: Stephanie Dooper, a senior majoring in Political Science and Liberal Studies.

UofL even houses those who protect the revelers during the week’s events. Julie Weber, director of campus housing, said about 50 Kentucky State Police officers will stay in Unitas Hall during the long weekend. In the past, members of the National Guard have also used campus accommodations. New this year, about 20 employees from NBC Sports will be staying at the Arch Apartments, one of UofL’s affiliates. “They were just trying to find something close and affordable for their large crew who are working 16 to 17 hours a day,” she said. “For state agencies or other service-type organizations, we’re happy to do it. It’s not a big money maker for us, we’re just doing our part to support the Derby.”

Other Derby ties

Some other Derby-esque traditions at UofL include a Derby Lecture Series hosted by the Chemistry Graduate Student Association. This year’s lecture features Alan Heeger, a Nobel Prize winner in 2000, presenting two lectures – one scientifically technical lecture May 9, and one geared toward a general audience on May 10.

The Department of ����ֱ��al Leadership, Evaluation and Organizational Development will host a Derby Party May 2 from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. in the Mary Bingham Room in the University Club. It includes a contest for best hat and Derby attire.

Finally, it wouldn’t be the Derby without a party, and Cardinal alums from San Francisco to Philadelphia take care of that. A complete list of UofL Alumni chapters hosting Derby parties is . ��