Honor In Peace wins Lady Legends race
May 15, 2010BALTIMORE (AP) -Eleven years after retiring with 763 wins, Gwen Jocson captured No. 764.
Jocson rode Honor In Peace to victory Friday in the Lady Legends race, a six-furlong event at Pimlico in which all the riders were former female jockeys.
Jocson passed Mass Destruction with a furlong to go and won by 2 3/4 lengths over Chapel of Love, who was ridden by Andrea Seefeldt Knight. Rasher took third with Mary Russ Tortora aboard.
The focus of the reunion was breast cancer awareness. Mass Destruction, ridden by breast cancer survivor Mary Wiley Wagner, was fourth. Patti Cooksey, another breast cancer survivor, finished fifth on 2-1 favorite Cleric.
Jocson won 763 races from 1989-99. Because this $30,000 race officially counted in each jockey's career totals, she can formally amend that number when bragging to her friends.
``Well, I won my first race and I won my last race. If I hadn't won this race, I'd had to go back to riding, and get back even,'' Jocson said. ``It felt great because it was for a cause. This was a once-in-a-lifetime thing, and I got to be a part of it.''
Honor In Peace ran the race in 1:11.2 and paid $8.60, $4 and $3.
``I felt like I was on a rocket. When the gates opened, all I felt was horse,'' Jocson said. ``It makes me want to come back to riding.''
Chapel of Love paid $4.60 and $3.20, and Rasher returned $3 to show.
``I can relax now,'' Tortora said. ``My sister died of breast cancer, so this was very dear to me.''
Cooksey, now 52 and working for the Kentucky Racing Commission, retired in 2004 after a 26-year career. She ranks third among female jockeys with 2,137 victories.
Her bid to earn another win was denied after she was forced to run wide in the lane and failed to make up ground down the stretch.
Barbara Jo Rubin was sixth aboard Brogue, Jennifer Rowland Small came in seventh on Temperance Time, and Agave Ridge was last with Cheryl White in the saddle.