Jockey & Trainer News 2023

[Curtis]

Martin chose to ride the maiden winner Holiday Camp, who was unplaced and never won again. That must be right up there with the worst jockey decisions ever. Can't blame Bob for keeping Victor on American Pharoah, but making Martin travel with him would have been a bit much. Who was Dortmund's regular rider in the fall and spring? I assume Martin missed out on him too.

David Flores says hello while on top of El Gato Malo.

[Diver52]

Martin chose to ride the maiden winner Holiday Camp, who was unplaced and never won again. That must be right up there with the worst jockey decisions ever. Can't blame Bob for keeping Victor on American Pharoah, but making Martin travel with him would have been a bit much. Who was Dortmund's regular rider in the fall and spring? I assume Martin missed out on him too.

David Flores says hello while on top of El Gato Malo.

Really? I thought Baffert had slid him out of the rotation much earlier. But it's hard to keep them straight.

[Flanders]

Didn't Gary Stevens ride Dortmund after Garcia? Then Baffert and Shah parted ways and he didn't train him at 4.

[Diver52]

Didn't Gary Stevens ride Dortmund after Garcia? Then Baffert and Shah parted ways and he didn't train him at 4.

Winnerwinnerchickendinner for Martin and Bob.

I'm thinking Gary Stevens too; I'm sure David Flores was back in the General Challenge days.

[Curtis]

Didn't Gary Stevens ride Dortmund after Garcia? Then Baffert and Shah parted ways and he didn't train him at 4.

Baffert had Dortmund at 4, he ran a couple of big races against Chrome. One at DMR and the other at Santa Anita. He ran third in the Pacific Classic behind Chrome with Bejerano up on Dortmund.

[Curtis]

Didn't Gary Stevens ride Dortmund after Garcia? Then Baffert and Shah parted ways and he didn't train him at 4.

El Gato Malo was the horse David Flores chose to go out of town to ride leaving Zenyatta without a mount.

[Flanders]

Didn't Gary Stevens ride Dortmund after Garcia? Then Baffert and Shah parted ways and he didn't train him at 4.

El Gato Malo was the horse David Flores chose to go out of town to ride leaving Zenyatta without a mount.

Oof. I don't remember anyone but Smith riding her. Though I don't really remember who rode who very much. I forgot Dortmund ran at 5, I guess that was when he went to Sherman, for some reason thought it was at 4. Speaking of Flores, I had to look him up cause I hadn't heard of him in so long. It looks like he rode 8 times this year, mostly at Belterra.

[Curtis]

Didn't Gary Stevens ride Dortmund after Garcia? Then Baffert and Shah parted ways and he didn't train him at 4.

El Gato Malo was the horse David Flores chose to go out of town to ride leaving Zenyatta without a mount.

Oof. I don't remember anyone but Smith riding her. Though I don't really remember who rode who very much. I forgot Dortmund ran at 5, I guess that was when he went to Sherman, for some reason thought it was at 4.

After chasing Chrome around three times to no avail, Baffert ran him in the BC Dirt Mile where he was favored. Dortmund had a big, well……… hindquarters, so it seemed like a natural spot. I think Garcia was up that day but he ran off the board. Then he went to Sherman and ran once or twice at 5. I remember Art wanted Martin to work him and he always kept his string at Los Al. Garcia was supposed to work a couple of horses for Baffert at Santa Anita and then get over to Los Alamitos where Dortmund was scheduled to go out with the last set. Bob had another horse for Martin to work and then another and still another. Martin never did make it over to Los Al. A coincidence, I’m certain. I remember not too long after Aaron U. Jones fired Baffert, Bob claimed a horse named Kris Kross away from Jones. It was a horse Baffert had purchased for Jones as a yearling. Of course Jones had put a clause in the contract giving Baffert seasons to Forestry, that any money from those seasons could only go to Bob’s children from his first marriage.

[Diver52]

The Aaron Jones/Baffert split was a long time ago, wasn't it? As for the Forestry income only going to the four boys from the first marriage--well, that puts it around 2000, as Baffert and Jill were a thing for War Emblem and Point Given. I remember stuff I really, really shouldn't. I'd also forgotten that David Flores started out on Zenyatta. Didn't he take off to ride a stakes somewhere else? Another Bad Choice.

[Squeaky]

As I recall, Matin used to ride regularly for Bob years ago as a young rider, Bob kind of was mentoring him. Then Bob didn’t like something about a couple of his rides and demoted him to exercise rider which didn’t sit well with Martin but he did it for awhile. Then he kind of disappeared and had gone back to Mexico? Glad to see things have come full circle and Martin is back racing for Bob. Bob always said he was talented and a hard worker. I invite Curtis, Stark and Diver chime in to add to / correct my recollections.

Martin was, in fact, Baffert's mentoree and Go-To guy for a few years back in the early 2010s. He won the 2010 Preakness on Lookin At Lucky for him after replacing Hall-Of-Famer Garrett Gomez when Bob decided that Garrett and 'Lucky just weren't "jiving". There's no doubt that Martin made a very good living from riding for Bob and learning from him.

Where things went south for Martin was when he became virtually "chained" to American Pharoah......for WORKOUTS ONLY. He knew he would never ride the horse in a race, but rode him in scheduled workouts every time. He was even asked to travel with 'Pharoah when he went out of state, which would cause Martin to lose potential business with other barns. And this was just for timed workouts only. Bob used another exercise rider (Georgie Alvarez) for 'Pharoah's daily training exercises. I think Martin just decided that the only way to get out from under Baffert's thumb was to leave the SoCal circuit altogether, which he did.

I think it's pretty cool to see him take a call from Bob after so long. The feelings on either side can't be too hard.

I don’t remember Martin going back to Mexico. As far as I know he’s been in the Midwest. Pharoah, was originally, Garcia’s mount. He rode him in his debut. In the DMR Futurity, Baffert entered at least one other horse who had won a race. Pharoah was still a maiden. The way I remember it, Martin chose to ride the other horse so Bob put Victor up on Pharoah. Once upon a time, Victor had been Baffert’s go-to jock but by 2014, that was no longer and in fact Bob wasn’t really using him at all. When Pharoah blew that field away, Bob stuck with him. There is a certain amount of stuff a jock has to stomach to keep on Baffert’s good side. There’s a lot of juice that can be obtained but in the end, is it worth the squeeze?

May be mis-remembering but I think at one time Martin had VISA/ green card issues I remember reading about that a long time ago. I remember Bob saying “ he had some things he had to take care of back home.” Glad to see him return to winning for Bob with Citizen Bull.

[Curtis]

The Aaron Jones/Baffert split was a long time ago, wasn't it? As for the Forestry income only going to the four boys from the first marriage--well, that puts it around 2000, as Baffert and Jill were a thing for War Emblem and Point Given. I remember stuff I really, really shouldn't. I'd also forgotten that David Flores started out on Zenyatta. Didn't he take off to ride a stakes somewhere else? Another Bad Choice.

Yeah, Flores went to ride El Gato Malo in either the Lone Star Mile or Lone Star Derby. Flores was Bob’s guy around 2000-‘02 before Victor took over. I remember Flores rode Forest Camp to win the DMR Futurity

[Squeaky]

Why did Aaron Jones split with Bob? Would be interesting to have a timeline of Bob’s main owners and jockeys from 2000 to present.

[Curtis]

Why did Aaron Jones split with Bob? Would be interesting to have a timeline of Bob’s main owners and jockeys from 2000 to present.

Aaron U. Jones hired and fired an entire wing of the HoF starting with Charlie Whittingham. In reality, Charlie passive aggressively fired Jones. The reason Jones gave was that Bob was too tough on horses. He also alluded to Baffert’s marital issues.

[Diver52]

Why did Aaron Jones split with Bob? Would be interesting to have a timeline of Bob’s main owners and jockeys from 2000 to present.

Aaron U. Jones hired and fired an entire wing of the HoF starting with Charlie Whittingham. In reality, Charlie passive aggressively fired Jones. The reason Jones gave was that Bob was too tough on horses. He also alluded to Baffert’s marital issues.

I remember hearing at the time that Jones wanted to be the #1 owner in the barn and that wasn't happening--I think Baffert got in with the Thoroughbred Corporation (was that the name?) and was getting vansful of pricey juveniles.

[Squeaky]

Why did Aaron Jones split with Bob? Would be interesting to have a timeline of Bob’s main owners and jockeys from 2000 to present.

Aaron U. Jones hired and fired an entire wing of the HoF starting with Charlie Whittingham. In reality, Charlie passive aggressively fired Jones. The reason Jones gave was that Bob was too tough on horses. He also alluded to Baffert’s marital issues.

I remember hearing at the time that Jones wanted to be the #1 owner in the barn and that wasn't happening--I think Baffert got in with the Thoroughbred Corporation (was that the name?) and was getting vansful of pricey juveniles.

This sounds like Kaleem Shah too

[Curtis]

Why did Aaron Jones split with Bob? Would be interesting to have a timeline of Bob’s main owners and jockeys from 2000 to present.

Aaron U. Jones hired and fired an entire wing of the HoF starting with Charlie Whittingham. In reality, Charlie passive aggressively fired Jones. The reason Jones gave was that Bob was too tough on horses. He also alluded to Baffert’s marital issues.

I remember hearing at the time that Jones wanted to be the #1 owner in the barn and that wasn't happening--I think Baffert got in with the Thoroughbred Corporation (was that the name?) and was getting vansful of pricey juveniles.

The only thing Jones ever made public was that he thought Baffert was too tough on horses, the other stuff is scuttlebutt that I’ve heard over the years. Baffert actually brought up the thing with Forestry. Jones wanting to be #1 is probably pretty accurate. He got into the game with one nice colt—Tumalo, if memory serves—and politely took him to Whittingham who saw enough to take him. Jones wanted to control his fate in horse racing the way he did his lumber business. He bought Linda’s Chief to be a future stallion and he would stand him in Oregon. Jones then started buying fillies. One ready made—Belle Marie—one in the process of getting made—La Zanzara—and one who he got cheap as a yearling and turned out to be a real runner—Miss Musket. Shoemaker said something quasi-disparaging about Linda’s Chief and then lost a race on Miss Musket so Jones told Whittingham that Shoe couldn’t ride any of Jones’s horses. By 1975, Charlie had enough and transferred all but a couple of Jones’s horses to Michael who was just getting going. When Jones transferred his stock to Laz, he said something along the lines of, he thought he hired Charlie not Michael Whittingham to train his horses. I don’t think Jones was a bad guy, really. Steve Valdez once told me that on the night of the accident with Linda’s Chief, Jones was the only person to call him personally to check on him. He also learned from the wealth of training talent he employed to start buying into stallions and doing it that way. Whittingham got Jones to buy into Ack Ack, Laz got him to buy into Bold Forbes who had much in common with Linda’s Chief. Having watched both Dahlia and Exceller race in so. CA, Jones decided to send Belle Marie to Vaguely Noble and got the champion, Lemhi Gold from the pairing. The Jones horses moved a lot though. After Laz, they went to McAnally. He also hired former assistants. Neil Drysdale—Charlie’s erstwhile assistant—proceeded Baffert and Eduardo Inda, who had been McAnally’s assistant, followed Bob. At the end, I think, Jones had horses with Mott who once upon a time was an assistant for one of the few HoF’ers Jones didn’t employ, JVB. I think Jones got the dynamic he sought with Inda and decent results, albeit with horses Baffert had found for him.

[Squeaky]

Nick Zito had a winner at SAR -his first in a number of years. Wonder how he is surviving with so few horses/ winners after his peak in the 90’s.

[Essential Quality]

https://www.drf.com/news/brown-not-sure ... ricas-best

Can someone get this dude an award for how much he "complains" ?

First it was the Belmont and the track playing against Sierra Leone (was never gonna win anyways imo) when then the "quality" of races at Saratoga as if he didn't dump about a dozen 6 figure horses for 50 or less at his meet and now this

"catering to the Europeans" all because his other horse won the race at high odds and not the one he wanted to win and now the distance needs to be shorter for "his horses" because they are best at 1 1/8th and stuff like that.

I know some people might not find it complaining but I do I never have liked him because he seems like a unbearable jerk and all that with the domestic violence, but even if I did like him, all this is still over the top.

[barbaro111]

https://www.drf.com/news/brown-not-sure ... ricas-best

Can someone get this dude an award for how much he "complains" ?

First it was the Belmont and the track playing against Sierra Leone (was never gonna win anyways imo) when then the "quality" of races at Saratoga as if he didn't dump about a dozen 6 figure horses for 50 or less at his meet and now this

"catering to the Europeans" all because his other horse won the race at high odds and not the one he wanted to win and now the distance needs to be shorter for "his horses" because they are best at 1 1/8th and stuff like that.

I know some people might not find it complaining but I do I never have liked him because he seems like a unbearable jerk and all that with the domestic violence, but even if I did like him, all this is still over the top.

I don't much like him either-- the domestic violence issue didn't help, but there is something about him that turns me off

[Izvestia]

Should we change the Classic to 9 furlongs because it would suit more horses better?!? What a whiner. If you have a mare who can go shorter, go in the Mile or wait until the Matriarch.