Tag: luis quinones

Agent Says Jockey Mauro Cedillo Is “Going to Be Okay”

It was not hard to expect the worst when apprentice jockey Mauro Cedillo went down in a May 1 spill at Thistledown. It was as frightening a spill as you could ever see and it appeared that he had been trampled by one, if not more horses, after being thrown to the track. He was taken to the intensive care unit at Cleveland's MetroHealth Medical Center and was on a ventilator while heavily sedated.

But less than a week after the spill, the 24-year-old apprentice from Guatemala is in the midst of a remarkable recovery and his agent, Luis Quinones, reports that Cedillo is “going to be ok.”

That was part of a text message that Quinones sent the TDN Monday in which he gave an update on his jockey's status.

“I just want to let you know that Mauro Cedillo was taken off the ventilator (Sunday) and he was breathing on his own,” the text read. “He stood up and was walking good today and he was moving his hands. Everything is going to be ok, according to the doctors. God answered all the prayers.”

Things are going so well that Quinones is hopeful that Cedillo will ride again.

 

“He has no other injuries,” he wrote in a follow-up text. “He got very lucky. He will make a full recovery, the doctors said, and his plan is to ride again. But he will have to be 100%. It will take time but he says he wants to ride again.”

Cedillo was riding Spectacular Road (Road Ruler) in the day's first race when his mount stumbled entering the turn, throwing the rider to the track. At the behest of the jockeys, Thistledown canceled the rest of that day's card.

The 24-year-old Guatemalen native has been riding since 2021 and has 101 career wins, including 23 this year.

The post Agent Says Jockey Mauro Cedillo Is “Going to Be Okay” appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Source of original post

Mountaineer ‘Always Going To Be Home’ For Track’s All-Time Leader Deshawn Parker

Jockey Deshawn Parker has returned to Mountaineer Casino, Racetrack & Resort in West Virginia in recent years to ride a horse or two, but the track's all-time leading jockey was a bit surprised when he was named to ride in eight of nine races on the Aug. 7 West Virginia Derby program.

“My agent told me we had horses going in, but this was a surprise,” said Parker, who is listed to ride Bourbon Thunder in the $500,000 Grade 3 Derby and Bourbon Calling in the $200,000 Grade 3 West Virginia Governor's Stakes, with mounts in four other stakes and two overnight events.

Parker, who raised his family in East Liverpool, Ohio, not far across the river from Mountaineer, and still has his home there, decided in late 2013 to leave the West Virginia track and branch out to Texas, Indiana and Kentucky. At the height of his Mountaineer success, Parker often would have mounts in all nine or 10 races, five nights a week.

Statistics provided by Brisnet.com show Parker has won an amazing 4,785 races from 28,221 starts at Mountaineer alone, and 5,886 overall. He leads all categories, which include stakes victories and earnings.

Parker, whose mounts have earned $75.7 million, first started riding for trainer John Semer at Mountaineer, and eventually landed in the barn of Dale Baird, the track's all-time leading trainer, and as of Aug. 4 Thoroughbred racing's all-time leading trainer with 9,445 wins. That set the stage for multiple years of more than 300 wins for Parker, who in 2011 won 400 races.

With Hall of Famer Steve Asmussen just a handful of wins away from eclipsing the late Baird's record, Parker reflected on his success with Baird at Mountaineer.

“It's going to break my heart,” Parker said. “People would say Dale was very hard to approach, but I know that once you got to know Dale, he was great. He would even ask me to go on trips with him to buy horses. I felt honored he wanted me to go with him. And remember, Dale only had one string of horses that would go back and forth between the track and his farm.”

[Story Continues Below]

Parker earlier this year received the prestigious George Woolf Memorial Award, which recognizes riders whose careers and personal character garner esteem for the individual and Thoroughbred racing. He was joined at Santa Anita Park in California by Luis M. Quinones, another Mountaineer veteran and riding champion who won the award in 2020 but whose ceremony was postponed because of COVID-19 restrictions.

“It worked out perfectly,” Parker said of the delay. “We both ended up at Santa Anita together. It was a great weekend.”

And he's happy to be spending this weekend with family and friends in his own back yard.

“Mountaineer is always going to be home,” Parker said. “I love the track and love the people. When the (purse) money started getting less and less, I made a choice between having to ride so many races and win so many races, or ride less and make more money.

“To this day people ask me how I could have stayed there that long. Well, I love it, and I don't have a bad thing to say about it. There are great people there, including the fans. Mountaineer boosted my career to where I never thought it could be.”

The post Mountaineer ‘Always Going To Be Home’ For Track’s All-Time Leader Deshawn Parker appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

Source of original post

Quinones, Parker To Receive 2020, ’21 George Woof Memorial Jockey Award On Sunday

In a dual ceremony that will honor a pair of distinguished jockeys, DeShawn Parker and Luis M. Quinones, Santa Anita Park in Arcadia, Calif., will officially honor both the 2020 and 2021 winners of racing's prestigious George Woolf Memorial Jockey Award on Sunday, May 16.

Instituted by Santa Anita in 1950 to honor the legacy of the legendary jockey George Woolf, the Woolf Award, which can only be won once, honors those riders whose careers embodied class and dignity and have thus represented Thoroughbred horse racing in a consistently professional manner.

Currently based in Ohio, Quinones, America's second leading rider by races won in 2019 with 314 victories, was originally scheduled to accept the 2020 Woolf Trophy on March 22 of last year, but due to complications related to the COVID-19 virus, he will instead participate in a Runhappy Winner's Circle ceremony between races with his close personal friend and 2021 Woolf Award winner DeShawn Parker this Sunday.

Quinones, 42, outpolled a highly respected group of finalists last year that included Tyler Baze, Javier Castellano, Chris Emigh and James Graham.

“It's a great honor just to be on the ballot for this award,” said Quinones last spring.  “Winning the Woolf Award is incredible.  I'm looking forward to coming out there and I know this is something I will never forget.”

DeShawn Parker, who at five feet, 10 inches, “stands out” in any jockey colony, became the first African-American rider since 1895 to lead all American jockeys in races won in 2010, with 377 trips to the Winner's Circle and he becomes the 72nd Woolf Award winner, dating back to Gordon Glisson in 1950.

In 2011, he upped that total to 400 wins, and was again the nation's leading jockey by races won.  A Cincinnati, Ohio native, Parker, 50, was a dominant force at Mountaineer Park in West Virginia for more than 20 years and he has also enjoyed much success at Indiana Grand, as he led all riders there in 2020, and at Sam Houston Race Park, where he was their leading rider in 2015.

Fast closing in on 6,000 career wins, Parker is the son of longtime highly respected Ohio racing steward, Daryl Parker, who passed away in Cincinnati on March 4.

“My idol, my best friend and a great father!” Parker tweeted on March 5.  “He meant so much to my life and my career.  I can only hope to be as great as he was…”

Parker, who outpolled fellow jockeys Alex Birzer, Jorge Martin Bourdieu, Kendrick Carmouche and Aaron Gryder to win this year's Woolf Award, and Quinones, will be accompanied on Sunday by their wives, children and close friends.

Billy Johnson, who died last December, was agent for both Parker and Quinones during the years they were at or near the top of the national standings by wins.

The exact timing of Sunday's event will be determined following entries on Thursday.

The post Quinones, Parker To Receive 2020, ’21 George Woof Memorial Jockey Award On Sunday appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

Source of original post

Five Finalists Named For George Woolf Memorial Jockey Award

Santa Anita Park has announced a distinguished group of five finalists for the 2021 George Woolf Memorial Jockey Award, with the winner to be announced in February at Santa Anita Park in Arcadia, Calif.  One of the most prestigious awards in American racing, the Woolf Award, which is determined by a vote of jockeys nationwide, can only be won once.

Jockeys Alex Birzer, Jorge Martin Bourdieu, Kendrick Carmouche, Aaron Gryder and Deshawn Parker, veteran riders who have stood the test of time and have earned the respect of their peers and  horsemen in various geographic regions, comprise 2021's select group of Woolf finalists.

Presented annually by Santa Anita since 1950, the Woolf Award recognizes those riders whose careers and personal character garner esteem for the individual and the sport of Thoroughbred racing.  The trophy is a replica of the life-sized statue of legendary Hall of Fame jockey George Woolf, which adorns Santa Anita's Paddock Gardens area.

Regarded as one of the greatest big-money riders of his era, Woolf was a household word by virtue of winning the inaugural Santa Anita Handicap aboard Azucar on Feb. 23, 1935, and for his association with the immortal Seabiscuit, whom he rode to victory over Triple Crown Champion War Admiral in a mile and three sixteenths match race at Pimlico Race Course on Nov. 1, 1938.

Affectionately known as “The Iceman,” Woolf was revered by his fellow riders, members of the media and millions of racing fans across America as a fierce competitor and consummate professional.

One of America's hardest working jockeys and a mainstay in the Midwest for nearly three decades, Kansas native Alex Birzer, the son of a trainer, was born Oct. 2, 1973.  A five-time leading rider at Prairie Meadows in Des Moines, Iowa, and a four-time leader at The Woodlands near Kansas City, Birzer rides year 'round at three tracks, primarily, Oaklawn Park in Arkansas, Prairie Meadows and at Remington Park in Oklahoma.  Birzer, who has 3,396 career wins through Nov. 29, is married with three children and resides in Council Grove, Kan.

The key to his success?  Birzer, whose younger brother Gary was rendered permanently disabled due to a racing accident in 2004, has this bit of simple advice:  “When you get up in the morning, make sure you're proud of the guy in the mirror.”

A native of Cordoba, Argentina, Jorge Martin Bourdieu, 46, has ridden primarily in the Southwest, where he's established a reputation as a consistent professional who has overcome  injuries while riding both Quarter Horses and Thoroughbreds.  A regular at Los Alamitos Racecourse 20 years ago, he was leading rider at the Orange County, Calif., track from 1999 to 2001, with Thoroughbreds and Arabians.  A winner of 90 Thoroughbred races at Los Alamitos, he has returned on occasion to ride in Quarter Horse stakes, including victories in the Grade 1 AQHA Cox Ranch Distance Challenge at 870 yards in 2018 and the $100,000 Wild West Futurity in 2019.  Bourdieu currently plies his trade primarily at Turf Paradise, Sunland Park, Zia Park and at Arapahoe Park.

One of many talented Cajun jockeys, Kendrick Carmouche was born Jan. 18, 1984, in Lake Charles, La., and began riding at recognized tracks at age 16.  The son of jockey Sylvester Carmouche, Kendrick became a dominant force at Parx Racing near Philadelphia in 2008 and led the rider standings there four consecutive years through 2011.  Currently a year-round fixture in New York, Carmouche, the leading rider at the recently concluded Aqueduct Fall Meeting, is regarded as an outstanding “gate rider” and is known for his unfailingly positive attitude and consistent ability to produce with any kind of horse at any price.  In what he described as “the biggest win of my career,” Carmouche took the Cigar Mile at Aqueduct with True Timber on Dec. 5, his first-ever Grade 1 victory.  Married with two children, Carmouche is in the prime of a career that has seen him boot home more than 3,300 winners.

A native of nearby West Covina, Calif., Aaron Gryder aspired to be a jockey from a very young age, courtesy of numerous trips to Santa Anita, Hollywood Park and Del Mar with his grandparents.  Born June 5, 1970, Gryder broke his maiden on Jan. 18, 1987, south of the border at Caliente and went on to become leading rider at Hollywood Park's Fall Meeting as an apprentice—in a Jockeys' Room that included the likes of Bill Shoemaker, Laffit Pincay, Jr., Eddie Delahoussaye, Chris McCarron, Gary Stevens and Patrick Valenzuela.  One of the most articulate figures in racing, Gryder has worked in commercial film and television and has often advocated on behalf of the Thoroughbred industry.

Well-traveled, Gryder won the world's richest race, the $6-million Dubai World Cup, on March 28, 2009, aboard Well Armed and in addition to Hollywood Park, has notched leading rider titles at Churchill Downs, Arlington Park, Aqueduct and Golden Gate Fields.  With more than 3,900 career wins, Gryder announced his retirement this past month at Del Mar, but has subsequently agreed to ride in Saudi Arabia and also in Dubai, where his son is stationed with the United States Marine Corps.

At five feet, 10 inches, DeShawn Parker certainly isn't your prototypical jockey.  In a world comprised of much smaller athletes, Parker's height  belies an incredible level of talent that has enabled him to eclipse the 5,000 career win mark and to lead all North American jockeys, twice.  America's leading rider with 377 wins in 2010, Parker, who at the time was riding full time at Mountaineer Park in West Virginia, came back to lead again in 2011 with 400 wins. The son of a longtime racing official, Parker was born on Jan. 8, 1971, in Cincinnati, Ohio.

The first African-American jockey to lead the nation in wins since 1895, Parker has 5,822 career victories through Nov. 29, and in the opinion of many could be approaching Hall of Fame consideration.  A perennial leading rider at Mountaineer for more than 20 years, Parker has also enjoyed considerable success at Indiana Grand and at Sam Houston Race Park, where he was their leading rider in 2015.  Married with two children, Parker lives in East Liverpool, Ohio.

The 2020 Woof Award was won by Luis M. Quinones and the 2021 winner will become the 72nd jockey, dating back to Gordon Glisson in 1950, to be so honored.

The post Five Finalists Named For George Woolf Memorial Jockey Award appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

Source of original post

Verified by MonsterInsights