Despite Limited Sight, He Earns Derby Chance

Stewards have taken a harsh view of sight-impaired jockeys in the interest of the safety, but that hasn’t stopped at least one from competing in the Kentucky Derby.

And it won’t hinder Jo Jo Ladner today at Churchill Downs.

But Ladner, 24, knows that his mount, Northern Wolf, has little chance.

The horse from Maryland has won two of his last three starts, the only times Ladner has ridden him, but he is a 50-1 shot in the Derby and must break from the outside post in the 16-horse field.

“This horse hasn’t faced the kind of competition he’ll see in the Derby,” said Ladner, who lost sight in one eye in an auto accident at the age of 2. “But it’s still going to be exciting for me, getting a chance to ride in a race like this. I just hope the horse goes good and gives a good account of himself.”

Sometimes a chance for a sight-impaired jockey isn’t as unusual as it is unadvertised. Though it wasn’t well-known when he was active, Walter Blum, a Hall of Fame jockey, had sight in only one eye throughout his career. Blum finished fourth with Reason To Hail in 1967 and eighth with Royal and Regal in 1973, his only Derby mounts.

In Maryland in the 1960s, jockey Joe Momento had limited eyesight. He suffered an eye injury in a spill and thereafter the stewards wouldn’t let him ride on muddy tracks because of the mud that flies into jockeys’ faces and covers their protective goggles.

A few years ago, an apprentice named Charles Fletcher was denied a riding license in Kentucky because of limited sight and his lawsuit to obtain one was unsuccessful.

“The Fletcher case was something special,” said Keene Daingerfield, the retired Kentucky steward who was presiding here at the time. “That boy was blind in one eye and had severe problems seeing in the other eye. I’m sure there’ll be no problem with this boy from Maryland (Ladner) riding in the Derby. He’s been licensed there, has been riding regularly and that should be good enough for Kentucky.”

Ladner’s mother and father and sister, who live in New Orleans, will be here today. Ladner flew here Thursday night from Baltimore, where he has been riding at Pimlico.

“Where are you staying?” Ladner was asked on the telephone before he left.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t have a room. But I imagine I’ll be able to find one.”

Clarence Ladner, the jockey’s father, is in the construction business in Louisiana. He was driving down an interstate highway 22 years ago with his brother, Jo Jo and a couple of his son’s cousins. There was an accident on the opposite side, and one of the cars careened across the divider--slamming into the Ladner vehicle.

Jo Jo Ladner remembers little about the accident that cost him sight in one eye. All of the other injuries in his father’s car were minor.

“I’ve never even asked if it was in the daytime or at night, come to think of it,” Ladner said.

Ladner says that he has virtually no sight in his right eye. Three times he tried having cornea transplants, the last time when he was 13, but none was successful.

“After that, we gave up,” Ladner said.

As a teen-ager Ladner was riding at bush tracks that didn’t have parimutuel betting when he applied for his first state jockey’s license at the Fair Grounds in New Orleans. The track doctor gave him his physical examination and said:

“You’ve only got sight in one eye. You’re crazy to think you can be a jockey.”

To which Ladner replied: “I’ll be crazy if I can’t ride.”

He was issued the license.

In high school, Ladner played baseball and football. He also rode in motocross competition and said he once finished 13th of 100 entrants in a national event at the Houston Astrodome.

“I’ve never really had to make an adjustment because of riding with just the one good eye,” Ladner said. “Since I’ve been like this practically all my life, I don’t know any different. I don’t know otherwise.”

At the start of his career, at Louisiana Downs, Ladner said he won only once in his first 80 races. So in 1982 he went to Maryland, where apprentice jockeys such as Chris McCarron, Ronnie Franklin and Kent Desormeaux had flourished.

Ladner said he had fewer rides after his apprenticeship ended, but that he has made a comeback and currently ranks eighth at Pimlico.

Like any young jockey, Ladner has been following the Kentucky Derby for some time and was especially thrilled in 1982 when Gato Del Sol, ridden by the transplanted California Cajun, Eddie Delahoussaye, pulled off an upset here.

“My family knew Eddie in Louisiana,” Ladner said.

And, for Ladner, it was a bit of an upset that he even had a chance to ride in the Derby.

In Northern Wolf’s first seven races, Greg Hutton was the jockey. Before the Mister Diz Stakes at Laurel on March 24, Hutton told Hank Allen, Northern Wolf’s trainer, that he had decided to ride Diamond Donnie, another Kentucky Derby candidate.

Allen gave the mount to Ladner, who had been riding some of the trainer’s other horses, and Northern Wolf won the Mister Diz by 12 lengths. Diamond Donnie ran next to last in the Wood Memorial and isn’t running in the Derby.

Wheeled back a week after the Mister Diz, Northern Wolf tired under Ladner at Garden State Park and finished third in the Cherry Hill Mile. But then on April 22 they won a 1 1/8-mile stake at Pimlico, and that was Northern Wolf’s ticket to the Derby.