Tag: People

Trainer Luis Carvajal, Jr. has disbanded his racing stable and taken a position in the Gulfstream Park racing office, reports the Daily Racing Form.

“It was getting difficult to get clients,” Carvajal told DRF. “I had a slow summer at Monmouth Park and came to Tampa with about 15 horses. The stress and the bills and everything else was really mounting.”

Carvajal began training in the United States in 2006, and won a total of 192 races for earnings of $7,105,430.

The 50-year-old native of Chile is best known as the trainer of Imperial Hint, the “Little Rocket.” The small-of-stature horse had an enormous heart and incredible speed, setting a track record for six furlongs at Saratoga when he won the G1 Vanderbilt in 2019 in a final time of 1:07.92.

Imperial Hint would have been a fourth generation homebred for owner Raymond Mamone, but that he gave the colt's dam, Royal Hint, to the facility that houses his breeding stock, Shade Tree Thoroughbreds, when she failed to produce much in her first several years. He later saw Imperial Hint as a 2-year-old at the farm, and paid $17,500 for the eye-catching youngster.

Imperial Hint would go on to compete on the international stage and in two editions of the Breeders' Cup, retiring with a record of 14 wins from 25 starts and earnings of $2.2 million. Mamone sold him privately to stand at stud in Louisiana, and the owner passed away in 2021.

Read more at the Daily Racing Form.

The post Imperial Hint’s Trainer Luis Carvajal, Jr. Disbands Stable, Takes Racing Office Position appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

Source of original post

Sunday is the first day of the rest of Maddie Rowland's life.

Her new life, as a journeywoman jockey.

Today marked an entire year since her fifth career victory, meaning the 19-year-old can no longer ride with an apprentice weight allowance that has made her services valuable to a wide number of trainers.

It's typical for horsemen to flee from newly-turned journeymen and journeywomen riders, unless they're blessed with Steve Cauthen-esque talent. Rowland may have already discovered that truth, as she is named to ride one horse today and two on Wednesday.

Her business had already slowed during a zero-for-58 stretch at Tampa Bay Downs from mid-December through Jan. 22 (she won a race on Jan. 14 at Gulfstream aboard Bahamian Moon for owners Ridenjac Racing and David F. Kegley and trainer Carlos David).

Rowland finally broke her Oldsmar dry spell Friday in dramatic fashion, winning the eighth race on 67-1 shot Commander Keith for owner Jim Thomas and trainer Brian Lusk. Fans surrounding the winner's circle applauded warmly for Rowland, fans who remember how she took Tampa Bay Downs by storm last season by finishing ninth in the standings with 34 victories, earning a Jockey of the Month Award and riding four winners here on the May 7 Kentucky Derby Day card.

Fans who like rooting for a teenager who is not afraid to challenge the established forces.

Rowland described it as a “significant” victory, effectively bringing her apprentice career to an end. The memories of those successes will endure, but she knows it is time to move forward and show that the grit and the armor she's acquired through the recent tough times can make her a force to be reckoned with.

“The 'bug' (apprentice weight allowance) taught me what it is there to do. It gave me a year, the best and worst year of my life,” she said, laughing. “Mostly the best, but also hard. I'm really excited now to see how I do as a journeyman, because I want this to be the career of my life. I don't want to just settle. I want to keep improving, and the only way to improve is to go out of your comfort zone.

“For me, that's becoming a journeyman. (Business) might slow down and then pick back up, but I'm still riding for good people and am getting amazing opportunities that I'm thankful for.”

Rowland's agent, former jockey Eddie Joe Zambrana, is confident Rowland will find a new comfort zone and again be sought out by trainers who win races on a regular basis.

“I have a lot of confidence in her. I think that as soon as she wins two or three races without the bug, she is going to keep going,” Zambrana said.

Zambrana said the overall quality of riders at the track, along with the arrival of jockeys with 7- and 10-pound weight allowances (Rowland has had a 5-pound allowance this season), has made it harder for her to win races. Although she has won only three, 14 seconds and 15 thirds give her a respectable 33.3 in-the-money percentage.

Zambrana assures her fans there is much to believe in.

“She's going to be OK. She just has to work a little harder to show people she can keep doing well without the bug,” he said. “She's really, really smart and she knows what she's doing on a horse, so I don't think it's going to be a problem for her.

“She tries hard and she wants to do better, so that helps, too,” Zambrana said.

Rowland says her slump, if you want to call it that, has added a layer of steely armor to her psyche, which every jockey must nurture to bring out their best. She knows she has gotten better switching her stick from one hand to the other, being patient during a race, seeking out the best trip on the turf and being more aware of her competition.

But she also wants to stay strong mentally no matter what comes up, attaching herself to people who share her ambitions and can help her achieve them.

“You really just have to keep going,” Rowland said. “Stuff does not fall in your lap in this game. You want it to, but at the end of the day, you have to go for it. You have to be the one to show up at the barn with confidence and walk into the paddock with the mindset that 'You know what? I can do this because I know I'm a good rider.' ”

Rowland and Zambrana know she needs to prove, again, she is capable of producing more of those happy times like Friday on Commander Keith.

The fun for Rowland and her fans may be just beginning.

The post ‘Stuff Does Not Fall In Your Lap In This Game’: Jockey Maddie Rowland Begins Journeyman Career appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

Source of original post

After becoming the first female jockey in Oaklawn history to surpass $1 million in purse earnings at a meet last season, jockey Kelsi Harr broke another record Saturday.

Based on statistics from Equibase, racing's official data gathering organization, Harr has amassed $2,811,257 in career purse earnings at Oaklawn. Cindy Murphy held the previous Oaklawn record for career purse earnings by a female jockey ($2,792,644).

Harr eclipsed Murphy's total with her second mount Saturday when Arkansas-bred standout Bandit Point earned $650 in the ninth race, a $104,000 allowance for older horses at 1 1/16 miles. Bandit Point was already the most influential horse in Harr's career since he marked her first career mount and winner June 17, 2018, at Canterbury Park. Harr's fiancée, Robert N. Cline, owns and trains Bandit Point, the jockey's all-time favorite horse.

“For it to be him, I thought it was fitting for sure,” Harr said during training hours Sunday morning. “I didn't know until afterwards, but I was told by somebody that when I ran fourth in the first race, I was $50 short of the milestone. Even though (Bandit Point) ran seventh, he was the one that put me over, so I thought that was perfect. Wish we would have won and done it, but love it that it was with him. Everything started with him. It was awesome.”

Harr, 30, began riding at Oaklawn in 2019 and has increased her mounts and purse earnings each season. She was Oaklawn's leading apprentice jockey in 2020 with 11 victories and rode 18 winners at the 2021-2022 meeting, with her mounts earning $1,187,724 in purses.

Murphy, riding mostly as Cindy Noll, recorded 183 victories at Oaklawn in 1997-2006. She remains Oaklawn's runaway leader among female riders for career victories. She also set a single-season Oaklawn record for victories by a female rider (47) in 1999. Harr entered Sunday with 41 victories in her Oaklawn career, including two this season.

A native of tiny Slovak, Ark., about 45 miles east of Little Rock, Harr also gallops and works horses for Cline and is a longtime exercise rider at Oaklawn for trainer Al Cates of Hot Springs.

Bandit Point, an 8-year-old son of Indy Squall, has $512,640 in career earnings.

The post Jockey Harr Eclipses An Oaklawn Earnings Record appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

Source of original post

When you train a horse like undefeated superstar Flightline, you can have the experiences John Sadler has enjoyed the past two weeks.

First, it was a five-day trip to London last week where Sadler accepted Flightline's award as the Longines World's Best Racehorse from the International Federation of Horseracing Authorities. Then this week, Sadler went on a four-day sojourn to South Florida where on Thursday he accepted Flightline's Eclipse Awards for 2022 Horse of the Year and champion older dirt male.

On Saturday morning, the 66-year-old conditioner was back trackside at Santa Anita and “ready to be home for a while.

“It was great. We had two great trips,” Sadler noted. “The setting for the Eclipse Awards was beautiful, The Breakers hotel (in Palm Beach). It was like a resort right on the beach. Two great trips back-to-back, so I'm ready to be home for a while.”

In London, Flightline not only was officially crowned the world's best racehorse of 2022, but he received an official rating of 140 by a panel of international handicappers in what was a surprise move. That put him equal with the great European superstar Frankel, who was a perfect 14-for-14 on turf from 2010 through 2012. Additionally, Flightline's rating was the highest for a North American-trained horse since Cigar earned a 135 in 1996.
Flightline had originally received a rating of 139 for his 19 ¼-length demolition in last summer's Grade 1 Pacific Classic, but the international panel upgraded it by a pound during a meeting in December.

Sadler was joined in London by members of Flightline's ownership group including Terry Finley of West Point Thoroughbreds, Bill Farish of Woodford Racing, Stephanie Hronis of Hronis Racing and breeder Jane Lyon of Summer Wind Farm in Georgetown, Ky.

Sadler noted the experience was like none he had experienced before in London.

“I'd been through London, but never spent that much time there,” Sadler said. “We got to see a lot of the city. I did more than I've ever done.”

At the Eclipse Awards, Flightline won champion older dirt male after receiving 240 of a possible 246 first-place votes, which included two abstentions.

For Horse of the Year, Flightline tallied 239 votes for Horse of the Year.

“It was good and better,” Sadler said of his two-week experience. “It was all just so nice.”

Flightline's international coronation comes following a career where he was a perfect 6-for-6 in two seasons of racing with those victories coming by a combined 71 lengths. In last year's Horse of the Year campaign, Flightline won the Grade 1 Metropolitan Handicap, Pacific Classic and Breeders' Cup Classic by 8 ¼ lengths. The now 5-year-old son of Tapit out of Feathered, by Indian Charlie, was retired following the Breeders' Cup Classic (G1). He will stand the upcoming breeding season at Lane's End in Versailles, Ky. for an advertised fee of $200,000.

Throughout the two weeks, Sadler said there was one experience that stood out from the rest.

“It was all so great, but I guess my favorite moment was at the Eclipse Awards when they went to Horse of the Year,” Sadler reflected. “The (presenter) said, 'I'm not even going to open the envelope.' He goes, '3, 2, 1' and everyone in the room yells 'Flightline!' That was a great moment.”

The post ‘I’m Ready To Be Home For A While’: After Whirlwind Two Weeks, Flightline’s Trainer Back At Santa Anita Base appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

Source of original post