A plane carrying 11 South African Thoroughbreds, among them current Equus Horse of the Year Princess Calla (SAf) (Flower Alley) and Breeders' Cup qualifier Beach Bomb (SAf) (Lancaster Bomber), touched down at New York's JFK Airport on Thursday, the Sporting Post reported. November's Breeders' Cup World Thoroughbred Championships at Del Mar are on the radar for several of the new arrivals, who will now spend two months in quarantine.
The first direct export flight from South Africa since 2003, the plan was chartered after champion owner/breederGaynor Rupert of Drakenstein Stud, her racing manager Kevin Sommerville, Robin Bruss of Northfields Bloodstock, Team Valor International's Barry Irwin, CTB Forwarding Pty., Ltd's Gerard Connolly and Mersant International New York joined forces to facilitate the trip. Originating in Johannesburg, the plane made a refueling stop in Barbados prior to touching down in the Empire State.
Rupert's homebred MG1SW Beach Bomb, already successful in the G1 Cartier Paddock S., a “Win And You're In” for the GI Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Turf, anchors the Drakenstein quintet. Grade 3 winner Golden Hostess (SAf) (Gold Standard {SAf), also MG1SP, as well as GSW & G1SP Distant Winter (SAf) (What A Winter {SAf}), Hunting Trip (SAf) (Trippi) and GSP Coldhardstare (SAf) (What A Winter {SAf}) complete the fivesome.
Irwin, who experienced great success with South African exports previously and had chartered the final flight in 2003 with Bruss, sent a trio–Equus Champion 3-Year-Old Filly Bless My Stars (SAf) (Gimmethegreenlight {Aus}) who is also bound for the Filly & Mare Turf; GSW & G1SP Feather Boa (SAf) (Flower Alley); and former smart juvenile Eqyptian Mau (SAf) (Fire Away), a Grade 3 winner and Grade 1-placed at two.
Irwin told Sporting Post, “It has been meaningful to get this over the line since it is 20 years+ since the last time Robin and I did it. I hope that the results are just as successful. It would have been nice if the enterprise received a bit more support from key players. But as the old saying goes, TISAB !This is South Africa, baby!”
Other owners were encouraged by the group to participate, with trainer Sean Tarry and owner Mario Ferreira sending the aforementioned five-time Grade 1 winner Princess Calla. She has a pair of Breeders' Cup options–either the GI Filly & Mare Sprint or the GI Mile versus males.
Tarry said on his website, “There is a lot of planning still to do. It wasn't a last minute decision, but I don't think there is a firm plan. She certainly has the option to race still. She took her run on Saturday very well [third in the G1 Wilgerbosdrift H F Oppenheimer Horse Chestnut S.] and she's sound. In terms of breeding I am sure the world will be her oyster.”
Hollywood Syndicate's 2023 Equus Champion Sprinter and MG1SW Isivunguvungu (SAf) (What A Winter {SAf}) was also on board. The 5-year-old gelding will target the GI Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint. Completing the 11 visitors is Ridgemont Stud's MG1SW Make It Snappy (SAf) (Dynasty {SAf}), heroine of the G1 Cape Fillies Guineas and G1 Paddock S.
Breeders Cup's Josh Christian told the publication, “We are thrilled that the South African horses have arrived in New York on their way to the Breeders Cup World Championships! None of this would be possible without the help and support of Gaynor Rupert, Barry Irwin, Kevin Sommerville, Robin Bruss and Gerard Connolly. We are looking forward to seeing them at Del Mar in November and having the best from South Africa, Asia, Europe and the America's will make the Breeders Cup a true world championship.”
Northfields Bloodstock's Robin Bruss, “The USA export route allows South African horses to compete almost up to flight date as Horse of the Year Princess Calla did on Saturday and was in New York four days later. The difference lies between the EU stance of pre-travel quarantine and USA's post arrival quarantine. South Africa is the 8th largest racing country in the world and established great success in the first decade of the 2000s winning Gr.1 races on four continents. Exports have been severely constrained for the past 10 years whilst waiting for difficulties in the pre-travel quarantine system to be resolved. We are the sleeper in world racing, and we want to be back on the stage, win lose or draw. I pay tribute to Gaynor Rupert and Barry Irwin for their willingness to go the extra mile and make things happen and give thanks to the supporters of this venture including Breeders Cup, Ltd.”
Leroy Trotman can effortlessly remember the moment he first heard the horses calling.
It was a typical Barbados day, the sun beaming down on a near cloudless morning high above the dirt road in the parish of St. Thomas, along the familiar route the teenager would sometimes traverse to and from Grantley Adams Secondary.
This walk, however, was unlike any other he had taken before.
“There was a horse farm, no more than a quarter-mile from my house, probably less than that, which I could see from my window,” Trotman started. “One day, I heard these voices, and they seemed like they were calling to me. And I thought to myself, 'I'm going to go see what this is all about.' I made the decision to do that, to take those steps, and it changed my life.”
A young life that was in turmoil.
“Growing up in an abusive family, knowing how things were in my house, I used to pray every day and ask God when things were going to change, when they would get better. Seeing my father abuse my mother, it was horrible. All she did was work hard and support her family. She was a stay-at-home mom, who did everything to take care of us. I needed something to turn to. It became the horses.”
Some days, Trotman would skip school just to be around them.
Gradually, his connection with the horses grew, as did his self-confidence and the want of a better life.
“I got caught up on the streets, hanging out with the wrong company. It's not what or who I wanted to be. I knew that wasn't the life I wanted to live. I wanted something better for myself. God, he put me into horse racing and because of that, my whole life changed.”
More than he had ever imagined.
In 1990, Trotman made the decision to leave Barbados to pursue a life in racing.
“My brother was reading the newspaper and saw that there was an opportunity to go to Canada to work with horses at Woodbine. Here I was, a skinny teenage kid from Barbados showing up on the backstretch at one of the best racetracks in the world.”
His first job was as a groom for Hall of Fame trainer Gord Huntley.
Trotman also freelanced when he was done each morning working for Huntley, a conditioner whose operation typically saw several of his band claimed or sold.
“By July or August, there weren't many horses around with Gord. [Trainers] Steve Owens and Rich Papa were in the same barn and when I finished work with Gord around 10 in the morning, I would go work for other people doing different things here and there. When I got laid-off from Gord, I continued to help Steve.”
His association with Owens would eventually be a game changer for Trotman.
But it wouldn't come without its hurdles.
“I ended up going back home because the government in Canada felt it was unfair to give certain jobs to workers who came from outside of the country. But thankfully, it got cleared up and when I came back, I started working with Steve. One day, we were just talking and he told me to go out and get my assistant trainer license. Steve and his wife, they gave me the opportunity to get my assistant trainer's license and to start making a name for myself.”
Trotman did exactly that.
He remembered what he was taught in Barbados, words he recalled every morning he came to the backstretch.
“I had to earn respect from people, and I worked hard to do that. Growing up in Barbados, you were taught early on that respect is something that you earn. Respect can take you so far. I always had that in my head. I listened and learned from people every day.”
Leroy Trotman worked his way up the ladder from groom to agent
When tragedy struck the Woodbine backstretch in August – a barn fire swept through multiple barns with 32 horses perishing as a result – Trotman was thrust into a new role working for Owens, who lost all 14 of his horses.
In the aftermath of the fire, he began working with the veterinarians assigned to the case, leading to a new racetrack role in the form of veterinary assistant.
Those new skills, along with countless others he had learned along the way, would play an integral role in the next chapter of his Thoroughbred career when he went to work as assistant trainer to Reade Baker.
Trotman recalled two early conversations he had with the veteran conditioner.
“Reade would be in Florida at times, and I would have to run the barn until he came home. The first time I called him and asked him what he wants me to do, he said, 'I gave you a job to do and if you can't do it, let me find somebody else.' And that really made me think. A little while later, I had another question for him because there was a problem going on. His response was, 'Don't call me with a problem, call me with solutions.' For me, a young guy from the Caribbean, someone telling me that meant so much because I was always hoping for this kind of opportunity, to have that responsibility, and he gave it to me. That's how I took it. I felt like I just won the lottery. I said to myself, 'Let's get to work and solve the problem.' And I did.”
The two men formed a formidable duo over their time together, sending out a slew of horses to stakes success while perennially charting in the upper ranks of the Woodbine training colony.
They got out of the gates quickly working as a tandem.
“My very first horse I prepared for Reade as an assistant went out and won. The horse was called Fire Power. We ran the horse a few weeks later, and he won again. It was so thrilling.”
But it was an Alberta-bred named Free Fee Lady who delivered Trotman with his most cherished moments working alongside Baker.
The daughter of Victory Gallop, owned by Harlequin Ranches, didn't show much in her morning works in the weeks leading up to her first start in the spring of 2006.
Something, however, caught Trotman's attention.
“Other fillies she worked with kept on getting the better of her. My eyes were seeing something no one else was seeing. Reade wanted to run her in a claimer but I asked him to run her at maiden special weight. He said, 'I don't think she'll be able to do that.' I begged him to give me one chance with her and she just got beat in a maiden special weight race.”
Free Fee Lady would go one better in both the Bison City and Wonder Where, the final two jewels in the Canadian Triple Tiara.
After the Wonder Where score, Baker, in his post-race interview in the Woodbine winner's circle, praised Trotman.
It took a few seconds for Trotman to process the moment and words he was hearing.
“Reade said my name in the winner's circle. He said that if it wasn't for his assistant trainer, this filly would have been running for claiming. Hearing him say that in the winner's circle, that meant the world to me. He didn't have to do that. He could have taken all the credit, but he didn't. I never forgot that.”
Just as he didn't forget an offer that had come his way during his 11 years with Baker.
Fellow Barbadian and champion jockey Patrick Husbands had approached Trotman in 2012 about becoming his agent.
Trotman mulled over the opportunity, but not for long.
“I'm a loyal person and things were going so well. It wasn't the right time and that's not me.”
A few years later, Husbands asked the question once more.
“It was the right time. I had a chance to be farm manager, but after talking to Reade, who I always passed things by, he told me to be in the public eye and that wouldn't have made me happy. When Patrick asked me again to be his agent, I asked Reade what he thought. He said, 'Leroy, go get it.'”
And so, Trotman did.
In 2016, he took over the reins as Husbands' agent, a job that came with a steady number of new challenges and plenty of unknowns.
“I was a horseman, but I learned about the business side with Reade. You need an understanding of business to do this job right. Self-employed, paying taxes – all of those things were new to me. I went into it with a little bit of fear, but life challenges are something you need to accept. If you want to go forward in life, you have to face those challenges if you want to go anywhere.”
Forty-one years after leaving his island home, Trotman, who at one time held the book of Keveh Nicholls, and is also the agent for Sahin Civaci, has gone further than he had ever envisioned.
It's something he's reminded of every time he walks through the barns at the Toronto oval each racing season.
“I have earned the respect of people at Woodbine and I'm thankful for that. I'm able to go into any barn and I'm accepted, whether they wanted to ride Patrick or not. I have so much respect for the trainers, in that I'm able to have conversations with every one of them. The acceptance of being an agent is something I am grateful for. People can say I got lucky by getting one of the best riders at Woodbine the first time I was an agent, but I worked hard to get that point.”
Others certainly took notice.
“Leroy has always loved working in the racing industry,” said Owens. “He is truly dedicated to his job, from groom to assistant trainer and now in his role as agent to top rider Patrick Husbands. Leroy is a gentleman and it's been a pleasure working with him over the years. We have always considered him part of our family.”
“I know that Leroy always has my best interests at heart, as a rider and a person,” added Husbands. “He's worked hard to get where he is, and he has never taken any of it for granted.”
There isn't trace of conceit in Trotman's voice when he speaks of his accomplishments.
Rather, there is an unmistakable humbleness in his tone, underscored by a graciousness that comes with the contentment of a dream realized.
“Horse racing has given me so much. I came to this country as a boy leaving school at 15, with nothing in my pocket. I continued to work hard and put in the effort. My thought every day was that I wanted to be a good horseperson. People say that someone is a good groom, a good jockey or a good trainer. I wanted to be a good horseperson. That's the only title I have ever wanted. I cherish that. Now, I have so much because I have the horses and horse racing in my life. I have three kids and a wonderful family life. How could I not be happy?”
Soon, Trotman will be back working at Woodbine in preparation for the upcoming season, eager to soak up the camaraderie and atmosphere of the bustling backstretch.
The once conflicted teenager who had yearned for a better life, the one who prayed to escape the unhappy times he knew, now walks a placid path to the place that has become his second home.
To where he'll hear the familiar sound of the horses calling.
The concept of the super trainer is by no means a new phenomenon in horse racing, but the huge stables run by super trainers have undoubtedly changed the landscape of the sport in many ways, from the backside to the racing entries. Are super trainers bad for the sport? Are there any benefits for an owner in using a “smaller” trainer? We asked these questions and more to a few trainers who may not be considered super trainers in terms of their stall numbers, but they have made the most of the horses they're given to build competitive racing stable over their careers.
Michael Matz offers a perspective on racing and training that perhaps no one else in history shares as not only a successful trainer, but before that, an accomplished international equestrian who competed in three Olympics and took home the silver medal in the team show jumping competition in 1996. Two years later, Matz transitioned to the racing world and it wasn't long before he made it to the big stage with the unforgettable 2006 Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro (Dynaformer). Other top performers include 2012 GI Belmont S. winner Union Rags (Dixie Union) and 2006 GI Breeders' Cup Distaff victress Round Pond (Awesome Again). As Matz approaches 800 career wins, he compares the state of racing today to that of the show jumping industry several decades ago.
KP: How did you first get involved in horse racing?
MM: When I first got involved in racing, I had a prior commitment with a young horse named Judgement to try and go to the Sydney Olympic Games in 2000. We made it into the top 15, but we had some better horses on the team. I ended up giving him to Beezie Madden and he was a really nice horse for her.
After that, I felt like the show jumping industry was going the wrong way and I didn't like some of the things going on with management. I always enjoyed the racehorses so I thought I would give it a try and I had my first winner in 1998.
I started out with about five horses in my stable. I have always trained for my family, but over time we started to get some better horses and more clients. At one point we had 60 to 70 horses, but that got hard with the help situation and I didn't want to have so many people watching over my horses. I didn't like being separated with a barn in one place and another barn somewhere else. I like to be a little more hands-on without having these big strings.
KP: When you moved from the show jumping world to the racing world, what was the biggest challenge in making that transition?
MM: Good horses make good riders and good horses make good trainers. When I first started, I didn't have that many good horses and I was looking into how I could get better-quality horses. As anyone can tell you, the good ones are easy to train. I watched and spoke with a lot of the bigger trainers when I first started and I think mostly everyone does things the same way. It's the same as with the show jumpers–the people who have the better horses are winning. You just have to find a way to get those horses.
KP: How many horses are normally in your stable today?
MM: Now, we only have between 20 and 30 horses. It's a little hard right now because it is a numbers game. Things have really changed from how it was when I first started. I mostly train for breeders. I don't have anyone going to the sale and spending millions of dollars. We'll buy some at the sale but that's always a hard situation when you buy one or two and there are four thousand at a sale.
It's getting a bit difficult right now and I think the big thing is that the ownerships have changed. More people are going into partnerships and you have half a dozen trainers getting all the horses. When I first got involved, I think a lot of the owners were a bit more loyal than they are today. The bottom line for them is asking their trainer, 'What have you done for me lately?' So it is a hard situation when you don't have the numbers.
Matz ponying undefeated Barbaro ahead of the colt's Kentucky Derby victory | Horsephotos
KP: What do you believe makes your stable unique?
MM: Any small stable can be a bit more personalized. You know your horses better than someone who has 200 or 300 horses. At this point in my career, I don't think I could handle that physically or mentally. Also, now that my children are competing in show jumping, I want to be able to watch them ride.
KP: What do you believe are the benefits for an owner in using a “smaller” trainer?
MM: The obvious benefit is that if you ask someone to train your horse, that person is going to be training the horse. It won't be his main assistant or second assistant or third assistant. The biggest opportunity that you have is that you know who will be training your horse and know that they can probably keep a better eye on the situation. That's my opinion and it's why it was hard for me when I had more than 50 horses. I just felt like everyone has a different view of something and if you don't keep your own eye on the horse, there are things that can happen that will go unnoticed.
KP: Do you think super trainers are bad for the sport?
MM: I don't know that they are bad. Obviously if they're getting all those horses, they deserve those horses because they've done well. For an owner, it's all about personal preference. If you want to be one of 200, that's fine. But it is all about numbers. It seems like it has gotten to the point where if one horse doesn't work out, they can just bring in the next one.
KP: What do you enjoy most about your job?
MM: It's a pleasure to be around the animals all the time. The enjoyment and thrill when a horse wins is such an accomplishment. I'm very lucky right now that the people I have as owners could not be a nicer group. I don't have a lot of clients now at this point in my career, but the people I do have are wonderful and they all really love their horses.
KP: What is the most frustrating aspect of your job?
MM: I do think there are things going wrong in our sport. It's funny, some of the things that I think were going wrong when I was involved in show jumping are the things we have problems with now in racing with each state wanting to do their own thing and have their own rules.
Matz-trained Union Rags races to victory in the 2012 GI Belmont S. | Horsephotos
I do think that when people are penalized, it should be a lot harsher penalty. Right now, I think organizations are afraid to do anything because someone can just get a lawyer and sue them. Whatever the rule is, we need to make sure it's the same for everyone and that we all start at the same starting gate and finish at the same finish line without one person starting 10 lengths in front of everyone else.
That's the discouraging part for small trainers in the business right now who want to do it the right way. I'm not saying any of these big trainers don't do it the right way, but there are things going on right now that need to be figured out.
KP: Do you think the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act (HISA) would help achieve the uniformity you mentioned in regards to rules and penalties?
MM: Nothing is really happening otherwise, so I think we have to go that way so that something does happen. I wish that something could have already happened, but right now every state has their own rules and regulations and nobody has a set standard that they're going by. The disappointing part about it is that nothing changes. If people get caught with something, they have to have serious penalties.
I think the biggest thing I don't care for is that if a trainer does get suspended, all they do is put their assistant in and the stable keeps running like normal. Maybe if penalties were actually enforced, things could happen so that smaller trainers could get some more horses.
KP: What horse was the most influential to your career?
MM: With show horses, it would be [1981 Show Jumping World Cup winner] Jet Run, who I had for a long time and was a great horse.
With racehorses, the best horse I ever had was obviously Barbaro. We will never know just how good he was, but he was pretty good.
To catch up on our 'Smaller But Still Super' series, click here.
When Slade Jones won his first race as a jockey, he felt relief above all else. Having the name Jones in Barbados racing circles brings with it a level of expectation.
Embarking on a career under high expectations can pile high the pressure especially when ambition and drive are proving not be enough to get past the milestone of your maiden win.
On June 18, 2021, at age 15, Slade Jones embarked on his dream to emulate the success of his patriarchs. Lifted into the saddle of Thunder Lady for the fourth race on opening day at Garrison Savannah Racecourse in Barbados, the rookie jockey finished sixth followed by a third aboard Pray For Me in the seventh race and a tenth place finish with Ultimate in the last of ten races that day.
With a few near misses at the wire in his 30 mounts throughout the summer, that maiden win eluded him until Oct. 16, the twelfth race card of the season. Sat aboard the 3/2 favorite, Pitons Punch, Slade says he knew that trainer Robert Peirce had given him a sound opportunity to finally take that walk into the winners circle. Slade's seven-pound apprentice weight advantage was of no use here as the favorite was saddled to carry 123lbs, the second highest weight of the eight competing in the five-furlong handicap event.
Bursting from the gate, Slade found a position on the outside of horses remaining within striking range of the front runners. Bumping and scrubbing his way to the front when it mattered most, Pitons Punch crossed the wire with half a length on the fast closing Super Heights, whose jockey N'Rico Prescod gave Slade a congratulatory fist bump while galloping out after the wire.
“It was the way you would want to win your first one,” exclaimed Slade when asked about the victory, “Bumping, knocking and riding all out for home. Very exciting.
“I felt a lot of relief especially with all the expectations given that my Dad is Jono Jones and my Grandad is Chally Jones,” remarked Slade, “With this first one down I will keep my head down and keep winning. I want to have the same success as them. They believe in me and I have a lot of good backers and everyone is happy for me.”
Being as successful as his father and grandfather is a grand ambition for any jockey never mind for an heir pursuing the throne.
Challenor “Chally” Jones is touted as being among the best jockeys to emerge from the Caribbean and was the first Barbadian Jockey to reach 1,000 wins in Trinidad. Similar to his grandson, the South Caribbean Champion Jockey began his career at the racetrack in his early teens. The talented jockey enjoyed success throughout the 1960s to the early 1980s when he dominated winner's circles in Barbados and Trinidad. He was the winner of the Barbados Derby a record 11 times and holds the Trinidad Derby jockey record (tied with Ricky Jadoo) of six wins.
Chally, who started out at the track as a groom, is one of six jockeys inducted into the Trinidad and Tobago Racing Hall of Fame. On January 1, 1972, he was appointed by The Queen on the advice of Her Majesty's Barbados Ministers to the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (MBE) for his contribution to horse racing in the role of jockey.
After retiring from the saddle, his success as a breeder and trainer have been just as impressive. Chally Jones has trained five Barbados Derby winners to date including three of his own Blue Ribbon Stud Farm bred horses (alone or in partnership). A filly, Paddy Bird, bred in partnership with his wife Diana, was his first Derby winner as a breeder in 1986. The great Incitatus, who Chally bred in partnership with Jean Louis Beuzelin, was the winner of the Barbados Triple Crown series (ridden by Jono Jones) in 1996 as well as Areutalkintome, another Triple Crown winner in 2009.
The aforementioned Incitatus relocated to Woodbine with trainer Ron Burke in 1997. He won the Grade 2 Connaught Cup followed by a head bob second in the Grade 2 Hong Kong Jockey Club Stakes in 1999 as well as the Grade 2 King Edward Breeders' Handicap in 2000, all with jockey Slade Callaghan in the irons.
Barbados Derby winners Overdraft (1991), Winsome Lass (1992) and Zarmella (1994), were all under the training of Chally and ridden to victory by son Jono.
Another prestigious race at the Garrison Savannah is the Barbados Gold Cup which began in 1982. Chally trained three winners in that race, Vardar with Patrick Husbands riding in 1990; Incitatus with Dale Whittaker aboard in 1997 followed by Federico with Simon Husbands in the saddle in 1998.
Today, Chally no longer breeds horses and has five in training upon which grandson Slade climbs aboard to exercise in the mornings at the Garrison. Three decades earlier, Jono Jones was a teen galloping for his father to gain experience before blossoming in the saddle.
Jono began race riding on May 26,1990 at the age of 14 winning his first race seven months later aboard Ruby Lass on December 8 for owner GH King and trainer Liz Deane.
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The following two years he was crowned champion apprentice in Barbados. In 1991, at the age of 15, he won the first of his five prestigious Barbados Derby races, aboard Overdraft, trained by his father for owner Herbert Gonsalves. His other winners were Winsome Lass 1992; Zarmella 1994; triple crown winner Incitatus 1996 and Alaska Pete 2000.
Riding for Barbadian Trainer Sir Michael Stoute, Jono raced in Europe and England and had a two-year stint in Martinique coming away from that island with riding titles in 1994 and 1995. He won his first journeyman riding title in Barbados in 2000, the same year he won his first Barbados Gold Cup aboard Blast of Storm for trainer William Marshall and owner Sally Arbib.
Jono joined the jockey colony at Woodbine Racetrack in Toronto, Canada and made a splash by winning on his first mount, Annie's Creek, by 6-1/4 lengths for owner, trainer Audre Cappuccitti on May 9, 2001. For the next three years, Jono would continue to ride at both meets during which time he won the 2001 & 2002 Barbados Gold Cup once again with Blast of Storm and again in 2003 aboard Thady Quill for trainer William Marshall and owner Gay Smith.
In 2004 Jono committed to ride the Catherine Day Phillips trained, A Bit O' Gold, owned by the Two Bit Racing Stable, in Canada's most prestigious race, The Queen's Plate, the first leg of the Canadian Triple Crown held at Woodbine Racetrack. After finishing a close second in the Plate, the pair went on to win the other two legs of the series, The Prince of Wales Stakes at Fort Erie Race Track and the Breeders' Stakes on the turf at Woodbine.
Jono won the next year's Breeders' Stakes with the Catherine Day Phillips owned and trained Jambalaya and again in 2009 with the Roger Attfield trained Perfect Shower for owner Charles Fipke. The latter trainer-owner combination had provided Jono with a Queen's Plate victory the year prior in 2008 aboard Not Bourbon.
While Jono was enjoying continued success as one of Woodbine's leading riders, wife Sara gave birth to their twin boys, Slade and Tosh, on May 3, 2006, in Toronto.
On July 8, 2011, Jono conceded to the battle of making weight and rode his last race at Woodbine, ending a twenty-one-year career at age 35. In his eleven years based at Woodbine, Jono rode 658 winners, and garnered more than $40 million in earnings in his 5,602 starts in Canada.
Jono and his family returned to living in Barbados and a short while afterward his marriage to Sara ended.
You will need to look to the ocean to find Jono these days as he now runs a successful long-liner fishing business as co-captain of Legacy Fishing Charters in Barbados.
Growing up, the Jones twins would split their time between parents and while Tosh had no interest in horses, Slade always wanted to become a jockey.
“Ever since I was little I always wanted to be a jockey,” imparted Slade, who mentioned he was named after Slade Callaghan, a family friend and fellow Barbadian who continues to ride at Woodbine. “Tosh is more into shooting clay pigeons but I always wanted to be with the horses.”
Slade Jones began riding at age six at the Barbados riding institution, Big C Stables, owned and run by his Grandmother Diana Clarke and his mum Sara.
Slade was a natural rider and excelled in showjumping competitions held at Big C Stables as well as in Canada at Iron Horse Stables until he was 13. His athleticism also made him a fan favorite at the Barbados Ninja competitions winning the competition at age 12 and again at age 13 when he competed against more advanced competitors in the 13-18 years age division.
Slade then began working at the racetrack exercising racehorses for his grandfather Chally, which is where you will find him most days now in between classes during his final year of high-school.
Slade's goal is to follow in the footsteps of his father. He is looking forward to moving his tack to Woodbine Racetrack when he is old enough to race ride in Canada. With the talent and support of his patriarchs, Slade is certainly one more Jones to watch in Barbados and one day soon at Woodbine in Canada.
Update:
November 13, Slade would record bookend wins on the card at Garrison Savannah, winning the first race with the two-year-old, The Code, in a photo finish and the last race aboard the five-year-old horse, San Pedro, with a well timed sprint to the finish.
