This Is the 7,000 Moment for Baze
Riding an aptly named colt for the trainer with whom he had the most success, jockey Russell Baze crashed an exclusive club Tuesday at the Pleasanton Fair, where he became the sixth jockey to win 7,000 races.
The milestone winner for Baze came in the $40,000 Pleasanton Stakes. He rode the late-running This Is The Moment, a 3-year-old colt, to a half-length victory over Peteski’s Charm for trainer Jerry Hollendorfer.
The win put Hollendorfer within one of 3,000 training wins. Only six trainers, headed by Dale Baird with more than 8,000 victories, have hit that mark.
Estimates are that about 1,000 of Baze’s wins have come with Hollendorfer’s horses. In the winner’s circle, Baze had some fun when he said: “It’s fitting that the horse had that name, and fitting that it was for Jerry, because he and I don’t see eye to eye a lot of the time.”
Ranking ahead of Baze are Laffit Pincay, 8,937; Bill Shoemaker, 8,833; Pat Day, 7,753; David Gall, 7,398; and Angel Cordero, 7,057. Pincay and Day are still riding.
“Laffit’s going to have to stop winning before I ever have a chance to catch him,” Baze said. “But he’s a great person and a great rider, and he deserves all his success.”
The next rider knocking on the 7,000-club door is Chris McCarron, who won his 6,904th race Tuesday at Hollywood Park, where he rode Dark Moondancer, the 19-10 favorite, to a 1 1/2-length victory over Sardaukar in the $150,000 American Handicap.
McCarron, fearing that Dark Moondancer may have been injured, pulled up the 5-year-old British-bred early in his last start, the Whittingham Handicap on May 29.
“The last race was a fluke thing,” McCarron said. “I don’t know how he cut his foot. He had the strangest injury to a foot that I’ve ever seen. I wasn’t worried about what kind of condition he’d be in [Tuesday], because I’ve been working him, and he’s been training awesome.”
Notes
Lemon Drop Kid unleashed a powerful stretch move to win the $500,000 Suburban Handicap by 2 1/2 lengths over Behrens at Belmont Park. Lager was third and J.R. Holmes fourth in the six-horse field. Lemon Drop Kid, clocked in 1:58 4/5, second-fastest running of the stake at the 1 1/4-mile distance, paid $3.60 as the favorite. He was ridden by Edgar Prado, who also won the Brooklyn Handicap with the colt on June 11. The race was Behrens’ first start since he ran second in the Dubai World Cup on March 25. . . . In another Belmont stake, Affirmed Success, running on grass for the first time, beat Rabi by 1 3/4 lengths in the $100,000 Poker Handicap.
