Noted owner and breeder Virginia Kraft Payson, also a pioneering sportswriter with wide-ranging outdoor interests, died Monday at her Payson Stud in Lexington, Ky. She was 92. Payson and her second husband, the late Charles Shipman Payson, entered Thoroughbred ownership in the 1970s. They found success campaigning European Horse of the Year St. Jovite as a homebred and also purchased and campaigned Travers Stakes winner Carr de Naskra. After Charles’s death in 1985, Payson continued to breed and race Thoroughbreds, with her stable producing prominent runners such as graded stakes-winning millionaire L’Carriere, a son of Carr de Naskra who ran second to the great Cigar in the 1995 Breeders’ Cup Classic and third in the inaugural Dubai World Cup. Northern Sunset, the dam of both St. Jovite and L’Carriere, was honored as 1995 Kentucky Broodmare of the Year. Payson, who was honored as Breeder of the Year by the Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association in 1997, also bred and raced runners such as Grade 1 winner Milesius, Rutherienne, and Uptown Swell, and graded stakes winners including Lac Ouimet, Ruthenia, Salem Drive, Scipion, and Strawberry Reason. In more recent decades, Payson decided to make her operation more commercial, selling most of her yearlings. In this span, she bred and sold a pair of Eclipse Award champions in Kentucky Oaks winner Farda Amiga and Breeders’ Cup Juvenile winner Vindication. :: Get Daily Racing Form Past Performances – the exclusive home of Beyer Speed Figures Payson’s horses were stabled at her Payson Park Training Center in Florida, which still carries the family’s name even though she sold the property in 2019. Payson, a native of New York City, had a distinguished career as a sportswriter. She was among the first dozen writers, and the only woman, hired by Sports Illustrated when the magazine launched in 1954. A sportswoman with wide-ranging interests, Payson wrote five books on boating, training dogs, shotgun sports, and tennis. She was a big game hunter, piloted hot-air balloons, fished, was a talented scuba diver, and raced sled dogs. Payson’s first marriage, to Robert Dean Grimm, ended in divorce. After being widowed from Charles Shipman Payson, she married Thoroughbred owner Jesse M. Henley Jr. After his death, Payson married David Libby Cole in 2008. Cole survives Payson, as do three daughters from her marriage to Grimm, plus three grandchildren. Arrangements are pending. :: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.