Horse Racing? Help!

My MC lives in the country and runs some stables. They buy a particularly fast horse, discover the horse's talent and are eager to race it at the tracks nearby.
My questions are...
-how do they get involved to start with, is the process long/complicated?
-afterwards how would the horse gain publicity, by winning more races and getting local attention ir by travelling to different events and becoming well-known?

Any knowledge would be really appreciated as I need to sound like I know what I'm talking about! (I love horses but clearly need to research racing!)

ooh wow...big question. Obviously the first thing to ask is "in the country where?" because there's obviously going to be some major differences between Kentucky, Texas, and England per say.
THe next question is...how big is your stables? Larger ones are probably not what you're thinking of...but think specific numbers, how many head? 20 or 200? Are they big enough to hire hands? Or is it family owned?
Obviously the biggest thing to consider is the stable's financial situation. How much have they got? I'm thinking this could be a major plot point.
What is this horse that they get? A mare/filly? Or a stock/stud stallion? ($$$$) What's it's breed? Thouroughbred is much larger than quarter horse racing, per say.
I'm not much help here...I digress. Check out movies/books. The best I've seen for racing is Dreamer and Secretariat. The internet is your friend.

Sorry I couldn't be much help.
~Elo