Annette Jasko Photo

Jose Ortiz leads New York contingent to Eclipse Award honors

by Heather Pettinger

Led by jockey Jose Ortiz, trainer Chad Brown, and Horse of the Year Gun Runner, many familiar faces from the New York Racing Association’s circuit received horse racing’s highest honors at the 47th annual Eclipse Awards on Thursday evening at Gulfstream Park.

Seemingly poised to lead a new generation of young riders nearly as soon as he took out his jockey’s license in 2012, Ortiz enjoyed a breakout season in 2017. Last year, Ortiz, 24, firmly planted himself in the top echelon of American thoroughbred jockeys, ending the year leading all jockeys in North American earnings with more than $27.3 million in purses, despite missing nearly a month of riding due to an accident in September and a minor knee operation in December. Ortiz, who is represented by agent Jimmy Riccio, rode 270 winners from 1,408 mounts to earn his first Eclipse as Outstanding Jockey.

“It feels great,” said Ortiz, who was joined at the Eclipse Awards ceremony by his parents, his wife Taylor, their daughter Leilani, and his brother, fellow top rider Irad Ortiz, Jr. “We have worked very hard and thank goodness we’ve had a good year. All the horses came at the right time.

“I got the opportunity to ride great horses and I’m very grateful to the owners and the trainers that have given me the opportunity to ride these horses,” he added. “My agent picked up my book in November 2012. That was about five years ago when I was a bug boy. Everything we’ve done, we have done together, so he deserves a lot of credit also.”

Nine of Ortiz’s 13 Grade 1 victories of the year came at NYRA tracks, marked notably by his first Triple Crown win aboard Tapwrit in the Belmont Stakes. Among his other Grade 1 wins in New York were the Belmont Derby Invitational aboard Oscar Performance, the Manhattan with Ascend, as well as back-to-back Grade 1 victories with Elate, who was a finalist for top 3-year-old filly, in the Alabama and Beldame Invitational against older fillies and mares. Along the way, the native of Puerto Rico added leading rider titles at the Belmont Park spring/summer and Saratoga Race Course meets, as well as a 4 ¼-length Breeders’ Cup Juvenile victory aboard Good Magic, named Champion 2-Year-Old Male.

“The Belmont Stakes was great and, of course, the Breeders’ Cup with Good Magic,” Ortiz recounted of his year’s highlights. “I really love Elate, so I was very happy when we were able to win the Alabama. She’s special to me, I worked with her when she was a baby. I worked her twice before she ran, and I took her to the gate. It’s very special when you get a horse at the beginning, and I got her at zero. She was a maiden first-time starter and I’m happy I was able to get on her in the mornings. I kind of knew she was very nice. Early on, she didn’t always show much but when she got to Saratoga, she came back. She ran very good in the Coaching Club and she won the Alabama.”

Brown, 39, saddled 213 winners in 2017, including 47 in graded stakes, and led all North American trainers with over $26.2 million in earnings en route to his second straight Eclipse for Outstanding Trainer.

In addition to earning his first classic victory with Cloud Computing in the Preakness, Brown trained a pair of Eclipse Award winners in 2017 in Good Magic, who was also second in the Grade 1 Champagne in October at Belmont, and perennial fan favorite Lady Eli, named Female Turf Champion, who won the Grade 1 Diana at Saratoga this summer.

From Mechanicville, New York, Brown also trained Grade 1 Belmont Oaks Invitational heroine New Money Honey, H. Allen Jerkens Memorial winner Practical Joke, and Joe Hirsch Turf Classic victor Beach Patrol. He also earned his sixth consecutive Belmont Fall meet training title and his second straight title for the Belmont spring/summer meet.

Winchell Throughbreds and Three Chimney Farm’s Gun Runner successfully used a pair of prestigious summer stakes in New York as a launching pad to Horse of the Year and Older Dirt Male Champion honors. Based this summer at Saratoga for Hall of Fame trainer Steve Asmussen, the son of Candy Ride captured the Grade 1 Whitney in dominating fashion, made all the more dramatic by a wayward horseshoe that mystifyingly made its way into the chestnut colt's tail as he powered home to a 5 ¼-length victory on August 5.

Gun Runner was no less impressive in his second Spa appearance last summer, subjecting rivals to a 10 ¼-length trouncing in the Grade 1 Woodward before going on to win the Breeders’ Cup Classic by 2 ¼ lengths.

Three-Year-Old Male Champion West Coast also turned in a pair of sharp performances in the Empire State last year, emerging as a formidable contender in the second half of the season with a gutsy win in the Easy Goer on the Belmont Stakes undercard and then wiring a loaded field to win his first Grade 1 in the Travers on August 26 at Saratoga. Likewise, 3-Year-Old Filly Champion Abel Tasman made the most of her two appearances in New York with Grade 1 wins in the Acorn and Coaching Club American Oaks.

Four other Eclipse Award winners made at least one start at NYRA tracks in 2017: Older Dirt Female Champion Forever Unbridled earned her first Grade 1 of the year with a a stirring neck victory over two-time Eclipse Award winner Songbird in the Grade 1 Personal Ensign at Saratoga prior to her Breeders’ Cup Distaff win; Male Turf Champion World Approval rebounded from a fifth-place finish in the Manhattan with a 2 ¼-length score in the Grade 1 Fourstardave this summer; Top Male Sprinter Roy H went on to become a two-time Grade 1 winner after making his stakes debut in June at Belmont, where he recorded a 2 ½-length win over seasoned sprinters in the Grade 2 True North; and 2-Year-Old Female Champion Caledonia Road, who returned from her second-place finish in the Grade 1 Frizette in October to win the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies.