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#1
06-04-2012, 04:46 PM
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As far as the dangers of the sport -- jockeys are the humans who mostly have to face it. Even with the danger they can face, they are still the most overpaid group of professional athletes known to man. The difference between the best jockey and the 75th best jockey isn't very much. 
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#3
06-04-2012, 05:43 PM
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I've watched my youngest brother ride a motorcycle about 40 MPH where he is standing straight up on the seat. One slip, and he's dead. He also knows how to ride a horse ... he's just too heavy. Being small is the true payoff.
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#4
06-04-2012, 05:46 PM
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they say that bravery and stupidity are not that far apart. i had thought about being a jock when i was a kid...and i'm probably dumb enough, and have enough of the ten feet tall bulletproof mentality to have done it had i not gone the navy route instead. god knows i'm the right height. weight wouldn't have been a problem...
but hey, all my bones remain unbroken, so there's that!!
__________________
Books serve to show a man that those original thoughts of his aren't very new at all. Abraham Lincoln
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#6
06-04-2012, 06:30 PM
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Chantal Sutherland is a terrible judge of pace and tactics ... and she can pass as a top level rider. I know you're a sharp guy, NTamm. If you tried to work with an avg mid-level circuit jockey -- you'd want to kill them in less than two weeks. I remember the first time my rider was on a post-time favorite in a race. The horse was 8-to-5 on the morning line, went off at about 4-to-5, and was lone speed from an outside post in a paceless race at a time when a huge inside-speed bias was in play. The trainer, Mike Rodgers, told the jockey he wanted to rate the horse -- because he thought the horse ran its best races from off the pace. I told the jockey that the trainer has no idea what he's talking about. Just make the lead, get to the rail, and you'll crush them. The jockey agreed with the trainer and he told me not to 'worry about telling me how to ride' -- he got the horse off slowly, raced wide throughout from off the pace, and finished 4th by about 5 lengths. A 15/1 shot who looked hopeless on paper and had no early speed wired them from post #2. That night, when I met the jock upstairs, I asked him "how many lengths would we have won by if you rode a smart race?" -- he blew up on me and claimed that the horse wouldn't have won no matter what he did. This was a guy who was a top 10 jock at Del Mar and Hollywood Park when he had his bug. He seriously didn't know anything about anything.
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#7
06-04-2012, 07:09 PM
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I think they have incredible athletic ability, but as you initially said, it is a product of their size. The best riders combine balance, strength, and at least the wherewithal to understand what makes horses go, what doesn't, etc. I don't disagree that trainers and agents will have the greatest impact on a rider's success. However, I don't think relative to the money that is thrown around in the game that they are overpaid.
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#8
06-04-2012, 07:27 PM
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Yeah.
Kent Desormeaux and Calvin Borel both have 3 Kentucky Derby wins -- the former won 598 races in a year as a bug -- those two intellectuals would probably be jockeying a cash register at a gas station in Louisiana along with Robby Al if they weren't as small as they are. I think if you look around at a lot of jockey colonies across the country -- the best jockey in the room and the 10th best guy in the room aren't separated by much...if anything at all. But you do make a good point -- a whole lot of money gets tossed around in the game -- and they do actually take health risks.
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