Stig Henry Johansson (born 26 July 1945 in Forsa, Hälsingland, Sweden) is a Swedish trotting trainer and former driver. He started his career as a professional trainer in 1969, and has during a large part of the career been a dominating force in Swedish trotting.[1] He is, arguably, the greatest in Swedish trotting history.[2] Internationally, he is regarded as one of the sport's greats.[3] Among the horses he has trained are top trotters Victory Tilly, Queen L., Peace Corps, Napoletano, Digger Crown, The Onion and Utah Bulwark.[4] Together with these and other horses, Johansson has won numerous major races, including Elitloppet (six times), Gran Premio della Lotteria (four times), Nat Ray Trot (once) and Prix d'Amérique (once).[5]
In December 2005, Johansson announced his decision to quit driving races, but to continue train trotters. The same evening, he drove his last race.[1] He won 6,222 races during 42 years as a driver.[5]
Johansson has won more than 7,000 races as a trainer, second most in Swedish trotting history behind Olle Goop.[6][7] In December 2008, Johansson passed SEK700 million (~US$87.1 million[8]) won as a trainer.[9]
^According to the article, printed in July 2008, Johansson had 6,979 victories to his name by then. As of 2009-03-08, he has won 30 races as a trainer in 2009, which takes his total number of wins above 7,000. See [1]
^In the conversion from SEK to USD, the rates of 2008-12-17, the date of the event, have been used