Paco Lopez

[Calzone Lord]

On Saturday, he became the first jockey to ever win 7 or more races on a card at Monmouth Park.

Monmouth Park is a pretty old track. It's been around since 1870. I believe it's run a summer meet continuously since 1946. So, it's a respectable accomplishment.

This is a guy who belongs on the big stage.

2014: 94-for-476 (20% wins) $2.20 ROI
2013: 231-for-1,050 (22% wins) $2.14 ROI


Career stats in dirt routes:

366-for-1,688 (22% wins) $2.09 ROI


Career stats in Graded Stakes on dirt:

100-14-17-10 (14% wins) $2.71 ROI

His ROI is also $2.72 in Graded Stakes races on Turf.


There are few jockeys over the last 25 years, who've posted ROI #'s like that, from sample sizes like that, across such a wide variety of categories.

You're talking about only a young Ramon Dominguez (Delaware and Maryland) a young Garret Gomez (Hawthorne, Sportsmans, Arlington) and Jason Lumpkins (Thistle Downs)

Dominguez eventually moved to NY and overtook the NYRA colony. Gomez eventually left Chicago and, despite all kinds of personal problems, became an eclipse champion jockey. Lumpkins was barred from Thistle Downs. He went and set records at Turfway Park and almost dethroned Russel Baze in Northern California -- becoming the first jockey to seriously challenge him in well over a decade.

Paco has been riding Gulfstream in the winter and Monmouth in the summer -- that's a higher level of competition than Delaware/Maryland, Chicago, and obviously light years better competition than Thistle.