When the horses sped around the track at the Kentucky Derby on May 1, there was one local person with a particular rooting interest. Starr’s Mill High alum Eric Armagost is a part owner of Hot Rod Charlie, a 3-year-old colt that competed in the prestigious horse race.
Armagost was a part of Starr’s Mill’s Class of 2011 and a key fixture on the 2010 state football runner-up team. After earning All-State honors for the Panthers, he went on to play football at Brown University where he met Patrick O’Neill, Dan Giovaccini, Reiley Higgins, and Alex Quoyeser.
The five teammates and Theta Delta Chi fraternity brothers traveled the world together and were always looking for new adventures. Sparked by O’Neill’s family connection to horse racing, the five friends set up Boat Racing LLC in 2018 and now own equal parts of a 25% share in Hot Rod Charlie.
“This is just another thing that we do that happened to turn into this massive (deal),” Armagost told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “It’s nothing that any of us had initially thought about it in that way of like, ‘Hey, let’s go invest in horses and try to go to the Kentucky Derby.’ It was more like, ‘Hey, here’s another fun thing we could do together.’”
Armagost graduated from Brown in 2015 and is now an investment professional in California.
Though Medina Spirit was the victor, Armagost’s Hot Rod Charlie finished a strong 3rd at the Kentucky Derby.
