After a relatively quiet winter at Santa Anita, jockey Umberto Rispoli has been in a groove since the start of the inaugural Hollywood Meet April 21 at the Arcadia, Calif., track.
Entering Friday's action, Rispoli has connected at a 30 percent clip (10-for-33) at the stand. Furthermore, Rispoli has bagged five stakes wins in California the past three weekends. On April 29, he won a trio of stakes at Golden Gate for trainer Phil D'Amato. He has since added wins at Santa Anita in the Singletary Stakes May 7 with Mi Hermano Ramon and the Grade 3 San Luis Rey last Saturday with Offlee Naughty.
Rispoli this week noted, “I'm the same person and rider I was Dec. 26,” when the Classic Meet opened, but the recent run of success has been largely due to having the right horses.
“I do the best I can. But like every jockey, you need the right horses and support from the big barns to get where you want to be,” he said.
Rispoli's run of success has largely coincided with the hiring of Matt Nakatani as his agent. They started their business relationship March 9.
“Matt is doing a great job,” Rispoli said. “It's always complicated to pick up the right horses. But he's doing it and I'm driving them to the wire.”
Nakatani is the son of retired jockey Corey Nakatani, who earlier this year was voted into the Racing Hall of Fame. Matt Nakatani described the 34-year-old Rispoli, who has ridden all across the globe, as a “world-class” rider.
“Umberto's a really smart jockey who knows the business inside and out,” Natakani said. “He was his own agent when he rode in Hong Kong. He knows how it works. So we're able to bounce ideas off each other.
“But at the end of the day, it's let me focus on the business and you ride in the afternoon,” Nakatani continued. “That's helped take his mind off what's going on in the morning and I think it's really paid off.”
Through 12 racing days at the Hollywood Meet, Rispoli trails leading rider Juan Hernandez 15-10. He is booked on five mounts both Friday and Saturday and has three more mounts on Sunday. He'll ride in both stakes this weekend aboard Honey Pants (6-1) in Saturday's Mizdirection Stakes for trainer Phil D'Amato and Acquired Class (6-1) in Sunday's Desert Code for trainer Peter Miller. Both stakes will be run on the hillside turf course.
“Umberto is one of the most competitive people I've ever been around,” Nakatani said. “He reminds me of my father, who I represented for two years when I was starting out. They demand excellence and only want to win. So for Umberto and I, the goal is to compete for leading rider titles and win graded stakes. So far, it's been going as we hoped.”
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