For a Woodbine jockey, the post parade for this afternoon's Queen's Plate is as meaningful a moment as the playing of “My Old Kentucky Home” in early May. For one of the riders though, it will mark a return to the saddle just in the nick of time.
Kazushi Kimura has taken Woodbine by storm since he arrived in 2018, picking up the Sovereign Award for Outstanding Apprentice Jockey in his rookie season. He won both the Eclipse Award and Sovereign Award for top apprentice jockey in 2019, and in 2021, he picked up his first Woodbine riding title. But the job of a jockey is a perilous one, and the risk is present whether a rider is in his prime or not.
On July 22, Kimura was making an outside move in Woodbine's seventh race aboard Beyond Borders on the backstretch of the E.P. Taylor turf course when the horse's front end suddenly disappeared from under him. Beyond Borders went down, sliding across the grass and on the pan shot, it looked like Kimura fell underneath him.
Luckily, Kimura says, the spill looked a lot more dramatic than it was. Kimura was pitched clear, and Beyond Borders got up and galloped off. According to Woodbine's media department, the horse was caught soon after the spill and seemed unharmed. Kimura said his agent, Jordan Miller, walked the course later and found an uneven spot (a rarity at the immaculately-groomed track) where he thinks the horse may have tripped. Knowing that information was clarifying to Kimura, who said he had no indication anything was about to go wrong.
“In the moment I was so confused – what just happened?” he said. “I hit the ground and he strided over. It could have been worse, but I'm glad to be back in two weeks, three weeks.”
Kimura came away from the fall body sore but without any broken bones. Like many jockeys, he wanted to get back in the tack right away, but had the wisdom to listen to his medical team.
“My doctor told me you have to be off,” he said. “To be honest, I was in bed asking, 'Can I jump on tomorrow?'
“It was a struggle, but it is what it is.”
Cryotherapy was a big help and on Aug. 18, just four race cards ago, he suited back up for the first time in nearly a month.
It doesn't pay to be a jockey who ruminates too much on past traumas. The profession is best suited to people who, like the horses they pilot, live in the moment. Kimura says he got good at that in his early days in the irons.
“I've been riding since I was a kid, five or six years old, and all the time I'd take a tumble. It's going to happen,” he said.
The key for a jockey is not letting people forget about you – and he's relieved that after some time away, Woodbine's horsemen are happy to have him back.
“After something happens to me, I'm more appreciative of what I do,” he said. “I'm always appreciative of the owners and trainers who give me good opportunities.”
Kimura hails from Japan, where his parents run a training center. He started on ponies, then show jumpers, and got his race riding skills from Japan's jockey academy, but he got his stickability from the ponies he grew up with.
When he finished the academy as a teenager, Kimura was (and still is) one of those riders who can't stand the idea of going a day without doing the thing he loves. Japan's racing circuit didn't lend itself to riding a full card every day, so he set his sights on riding in North America.
As a 19-year-old, he left everything he knew to move to Toronto, despite speaking no English. He said he chose Woodbine for his new base because he judged the immigration process would be easier to navigate than the United States. After four years in his chosen profession, he has the credentials he needs to cross the border and routinely makes the three-hour drive to Presque Isle Downs in Erie, Pa., to pick up extra mounts on Woodbine's dark days.
“Some people are not watching Canadian racing enough, so that's why I'm trying to show up in the States, and putting my name out there,” he said.
On Saturday, he picked up his first wins – three of them – since his return to the races two days earlier, including one in the Soaring Free Stakes. He is officially back and ready to maintain the 20% win percentage he has carved out this year. He will ride Ironstone, who is 12-1 on the morning line, on Sunday in the Queen's Plate.
“I really like that horse,” he said. “I'm feeling confident. I got on him twice in the morning and once in the [Queenston] stakes. He's always aggressive and eager at the beginning, but as he gets older he gets more comfortable and can relax. I can keep up a steady pace and we could get to the wire, but if he's feeling comfortable I don't have to go to the lead.”
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