Geroux's agent, Doug Bredar, told Blood-Horse his client will ride for “almost everybody at the top of the standings” at Del Mar and that the move could serve as a trial run for Geroux to move to California for the long run.

“This is short-term for the moment,” Bredar said. “We just wanted to test the waters. We've had a lot of people, a lot of horsemen out there have asked us to go in the past. We feel that now is the right time.”

The California jockey standings, dominated by Flavien Prat for the better part of the past six years, suddenly have an opening at the top after Prat decided to move his tack to New York full-time in a quest to win his first Eclipse Award. The move has paid off for Prat, who is winning at 21% at the Belmont Park meet and has surged to second nationally in earnings, behind only Irad Ortiz, Jr. The current leading rider in California, Juan Hernandez, is 10th in the country in earnings.

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When considering those winning trips, a share of the credit must, of course, go to the jockey's agents who booked the mounts for their riders. An agent knows a good ride when they see it.

With 37 years of Breeders' Cup races to draw from, we polled six jockey's agents to get their picks for the greatest riding effort in Breeders' Cup history. The answers cast a wide net from personal victories, to betting scores, to rooting for childhood heroes.

Doug Bredar

“For obvious reasons, it would be Gun Runner in the Breeders' Cup Classic at Del Mar. I'm still surprised that Arrogate went off as the favorite. The bettors thought that Gun Runner would have issues going a mile and a quarter, but the connections felt otherwise. Arrogate had beaten him a couple of times, and it was not only an incredible thrill watching Florent Geroux win the race, but redemption for the way he did it. The fractions were 22.4, 46.1, 1:10.2 and 1:35. He went wire-to-wire and I thought it was an exceptional ride. Very fond memories of a special race.”

John Herbstreit

“Arazi and Zenyatta are the most impressive horse races I've seen. Even when Zenyatta ran second, she was impressive. Alysheba and Personal Ensign are my favorite wins. My favorite ride was Pat Day on Wild Again in the 1984 Classic.”

Ron Ebanks

“Randy Romero on Personal Ensign in the mud getting up the last jump to nail Gary Stevens on Winning Colors (1988 Distaff). He was my idol as a kid and I couldn't have been more happy and proud of him.”

Jimmy McNerney

“Pat Valenzuela aboard Fraise in the 1992 Turf stands out the most. It was the first Breeders' Cup that I was old enough to 'legally' bet and I put $100 across the board on him. He came from last and P-Val made every right move weaving his way through the pack through the turn. When they straightened, he dove down and snuck through along the fence and nipped Sky Classic right on the money. There's no other path that he could've taken and had the same result.”

Mike Luider

“Gulch in the 1988 Sprint. Angel Cordero Jr. was masterful!”

Brian Beach

“Julie Krone's ride on Halfbridled in the 2003 Juvenile Fillies was one of the best I've seen. It's not always about weaving though traffic and getting up at the wire. It's sometimes about getting your horse to perform its best under adverse circumstances, and that's what happened in this race. They broke from the 14 post and Julie was able to get her filly to relax while going wide and still not expending too much energy until she could get a better position down the backstretch. By the time they turned for home Julie had Halfbridled in a perfect winning position with something left in the tank for the run to the wire.”

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The 34-year-old native of France recorded 17 wins from 64 mounts with purse earnings just shy of $2.2 million.

“We had a very successful Kentucky Derby week to begin the meet and we kept the momentum from there,” Geroux said. “We're riding for some great owners and trainers and, most importantly, some live horses.”

Geroux's early success at the meet helped him rise to third in overall North American purse earnings with $7,880,342. He sits just behind Irad Ortiz Jr. and Joel Rosario.

Represented by Doug Bredar, Geroux was tabbed to ride eight horses Saturday night including the morning line favorites in both stakes events: Frank's Rockette (6-5) in the $150,000 Winning Colors (G3) and Delta's Kingdom (5-2) in the $110,000 Keertana Overnight Stakes.

Geroux is seeking his first leading rider title at Churchill Downs.

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Midwest finished with 42 victories, but Geroux didn't ride any of them after one its trainers at the meet, Jamie Ness, went in a different direction with riding assignments. Quietly, Geroux left Oaklawn after going winless in seven mounts.

Betting that Geroux would fare better in 2021, specifically because of his relationship with Brad Cox, Midwest's other trainer during the 2012 Oaklawn meet, has, as expected, been a financial windfall for the jockey's longtime agent, Doug Bredar.

Through Sunday, Day 23 of the now 51-day meeting, Geroux had ridden 23 winners from just 83 mounts and bankrolled $1,594,830 in purse earnings. He was tied for second in victories, No. 2 in purse earnings, first in stakes victories (five) and tied for first in graded stakes victories (two).

“Very happy,” Bredar said Thursday morning. “We were second-leading rider at Fair Grounds and a lot of people said to us: 'Are you nuts to leave there?' We're pretty much second-leading rider here now, so it's worked out really, really well.”

Geroux began building his relationship with Cox during the jockey's brief stay in Hot Springs almost a decade ago and has become the go-to rider for the 2020 Eclipse Award-winning trainer. Geroux, now among the country's most successful jockeys, normally winters at Fair Grounds, but decided to move his tack to Oaklawn after talking with Cox, who maintains large strings at both tracks. Purses are Oaklawn are the country's highest during the winter.

Geroux and Cox, through Sunday, were 10 for 32 together at this year's Oaklawn meet and had totaled $924,574 in purse earnings. They have teamed for three stakes victories – $150,000 Smarty Jones for 3-year-olds Jan. 22 (Caddo River), $250,000 Bayakoa (G3) for older fillies and mares Feb. 28 (Monomoy Girl) and last Saturday's $350,000 Azeri (G2) for older fillies and mares (Shedaresthedevil). Geroux also won the $150,000 American Beauty Stakes for older female sprinters Jan. 30 aboard Frank's Rockette for Hall of Fame trainer Bill Mott and last Saturday's $200,000 Hot Springs Stakes for older sprinters aboard C Z Rocket for trainer Peter Miller.

“It's been special, very special,” Bredar said. “You hope when you make these plans that things turn out the way you want them to. We're tickled to death. Like I said, we're very, very excited. It's been a great year. I think we're fourth in North America in earnings. That's one of the highest numbers we've ever had. We've enjoyed our stay here. Everybody's treated us really, really well.”

Bredar said Geroux, 34, will “kind of finish up through the end of the month” at Oaklawn before Keeneland opens April 2, but “definitely come back” April 10 and April 17. Oaklawn's April 10 card will include four stakes races – $1 million Arkansas Derby (G1) for 3-year-olds, $500,000 Count Fleet Sprint Handicap (G3) for older sprinters, $400,000 Oaklawn Mile for older horses and the $250,000 Carousel for older female sprinters – while Monomoy Girl is scheduled to run April 17 at Oaklawn in the $1 million Apple Blossom Handicap (G1) for older fillies and mares. The $1 million Oaklawn Handicap (G2) for older horses is also April 17. Geroux is the regular rider of Monomoy Girl, a two-time Eclipse Award winner.

“It's gone better than whatever that year was,” Bredar said, referring to 2012. “It didn't work out real well. We're very thrilled that it turned out a lot better this year.”

Bredar also represents Martin Garcia and said Oaklawn's co-second-leading jockey in 2020 will ride regularly until the meeting ends May 1. Geroux and Garcia will both ride March 27 at Turfway Park, Bredar said.

Geroux, through Thursday, had 34 victories, including 10 stakes, in his Oaklawn career. His mounts had earned $3,599,825. Geroux is scheduled to ride the Cox-trained Warrior's Charge in his 2021 debut Thursday at Oaklawn. Geroux won the $500,000 Razorback Handicap (G3) for older horses last year at Oaklawn aboard Warrior's Charge.

Geroux's wife, Kasey, is the daughter of the late jockey Louis Spindler, who rode 27 winners at the 1973 Oaklawn meeting. That bulk of Spindler's victories were for Lasater, who won a then-record 48 races at the 1974 Oaklawn meet.

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In late 2014, Chocolate Ride was a horse with some promise but struggling to find his level. He had broken his maiden over the summer as a 3-year-old for trainer Mark Casse and owner John Oxley, and after not quite making the grade in several Kentucky allowance contests, Casse dropped him into a claiming race at Churchill Downs, where Cox snapped him up for $40,000.

Cox had won his first graded stakes, the Grade 3 Cornhusker with Carve, in 2014 and still did most of his work on the claiming circuit in Kentucky. Geroux's star had just begun to rise, as he got his first G1 victory with Work All Week in the Breeders' Cup Sprint.

Chocolate Ride began turning his resume around once he entered Cox's bar, rising through the allowance ranks at Fair Grounds and taking the G3 Fair Grounds Handicap, then the G2 Mervin Muniz, and even making a bid in the G1 Woodford Reserve Turf Classic (which was less successful – he finished eighth). He followed that up with a 2016 season of wins in the G3 Col. E.R. Bradley and a reprise of the Fair Grounds Handicap.

The gelding by Candy Ride wasn't the most successful runner for either man that year, but he was a memorable one.

“He was kind of a favorite of Flo's and ours because he's such a hard-trying horse,” said racing analyst Caton Bredar, whose husband Doug is Geroux's agent. “He was kind of an overachiever in that I don't know if you ever expected him to get as good as he did, but he won graded stakes races and was so consistent for so long.”

The same was true for owner John Wentworth and his partners in GenStar Thoroughbreds.

As horses often do, Chocolate Ride maintained his game spirit at the graded stakes level for several seasons, but gradually began to lose some of his prowess, descending to the allowance optional claiming level and moving to the Mid-Atlantic circuit with Brittany Russell. After a long layoff between fall 2019 and summer of this year, he resurfaced in the entries and just so happened to catch Bredar's eye.

“Since the pandemic we at TVG have been working different shifts,” said Bredar. “All of a sudden, in I guess it would be October, I was working a weird shift that I never work and I saw he was entered in a $12,500 claimer in Penn National. He had been claimed from the people who'd had him before, and I didn't know that. I didn't know anything about it.

“When I saw he was in for $12,500 I said in passing to Doug, 'Oh I hate this. Wouldn't it be great if we could claim him?' But we're not in the business of owning horses … it's a bit of a conflict of interest.”

Doug Bredar and Chocolate Ride reunite at Old Friends. Photo courtesy Caton Bredar

Doug thought it over and decided this horse had to be the exception to the rule. He called Cox, who reached out to the horse's former owners. Doug spoke with Geroux, and everyone agreed to pool funds and get their hard-trying friend back.

By all accounts, the gelding wasn't in danger – Bredar reached out to trainer Anthony Stabile, who claimed the horse in July for Scaronias Stable, and it seemed he was sound and happy being a racehorse. The owners had transferred the horse to Bruce Kravets and were receptive to the Bredars' interest, but said they wanted to run him once more.

“He wasn't in bad form, he'd been running in good form,” she said. “They really wanted to get him back on the grass, which is why they wanted to run him one more time.”

Fair enough, the Bredars thought. They decided to claim the gelding, which seemed a fair way to get the owners their race and their tag price while securing the horse's future. With everyone on board an agreeing to split expenses evenly, the challenge became logistics. Bredar's first thought was to call Old Friends in Georgetown, Ky., which sponsored a stakes race Chocolate Ride had contested back in 2017. Thanks to the recent opening of its satellite facility at a nearby senior living center, Old Friends founder Michael Blowen had a rare spot open at the main property. Brook Ledge agreed to haul the horse from Pennsylvania, where he was now based, to Kentucky for a discounted fee. Then the challenge became paying for the horse.

“It's all good in theory and it all makes sense, but it's just not as easy in practice to make it happen,” said Bredar, who thought at first she just needed to find someone with a Pennsylvania license and wire the money to the racing office. “Turns out even in the era of COVID, most racing jurisdictions don't allow you to wire money to the horsemen's bookkeeper. Basically, the morning of the race Doug was saying, 'I don't think it's going to happen. I've called everyone I can think of.'”

Not only could Bredar not wire money to the racing office at Penn National, she learned the horse would have to be claimed by a trainer and an owner who had previously started horses at the track, rather than just anyone with a license in Pennsylvania. A call to the Pennsylvania HBPA produced a few leads of trainers who may be willing to help, but then the quest was to find an owner. Trainer Bernie Houghton agreed to drop the claim and eventually word got around that the group was looking for an owner. Don Brown Jr. agreed to be the owner on the claim slip and in the last hours before Chocolate Ride's entry in a claiming race on Oct. 9, everything came together. Bredar wired the money to Brown, and watched the post parade with bated breath.

“We just crossed our fingers that the horse would run well, but also that no one else would put a claim in for him,” she said. “You were as nervous as you would be if it were a big race or if Flo was riding.

Chocolate Ride didn't go out a winner, but he did finish second – a respectable close to a career that had brought so much to the people around him, but also a sign that even with maximum effort, a win was beyond him now.

“Once he got back to the barn and we heard that he'd cooled out ok, Doug said, 'I think this is the most rewarding thing I've ever done.' When we went to Old Friends and I watched him, and we were texting Brad pictures, everybody was so excited that this happened. It meant so much to everybody. It took me a little bit surprised how much it touched us that this happened.”

Blowen tells Bredar Chocolate Ride is settling in at Old Friends faster than any horse before him. Bredar said if the gelding decides the retired life isn't for him, she will seek out a more active second career for him. For now, the group is happy to know he's living the good life.

“He looks beautiful,” she said. “Everybody along the way has really taken very good care of him. I know he could have been useful on the track, and that's also kind of a hard sell to some people, and I understand why. But for a horse that had been so good to us, it just seemed like this is what he deserved, to go home.”

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“We've been on a great run,” said Geroux, who won aboard Aunt Pearl and Monomoy Girl at the Breeders' Cup. “It was an incredible weekend aboard some fantastic horses. Now, back at Churchill, we're continuing to do well.”

In total, Geroux recorded 16 wins through Friday's halfway mark of the 24-day Fall Meet. Geroux, typically the first-call rider for trainer Brad Cox, has recorded victories for 10 different trainers at the meet. Besides Cox, Geroux has also recorded wins for Tom Amoss, Rusty Arnold, Juan Cano, Wayne Catalano, Phil D'Amato, Eddie Kenneally, Mike Maker, Tom Van Berg and Brian Williamson.

“We had a great Breeders' Cup weekend next to Brad's four wins,” said Geroux, who is represented by veteran agent Doug Bredar. “I've stuck with Brad for a long time and it's been a snowball effect over the last few years – not only at the Breeders' Cup but just for our business in general.

“It's been a challenging year when we stopped racing over the winter with the pandemic. We've been very grateful to be able to run and do our job through this.”

Geroux was named to ride six horses on Sunday's program and 10 on Wednesday and Thursday. He remained one win ahead of Tyler Gaffalione and Ricardo Santana Jr. in the jockey standings.

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