Uphill race
Women of Oaklawn earn respect on merit
HOT SPRINGS — There won’t be a shortage of talented female horses at Oaklawn Park today.
With calling cards such as the $600,000 Grade I Apple Blossom Handicap for fillies and mares 4 years old and up and the $400,000 Grade III Fantasy Stakes for 3-year-old fillies, Oaklawn’s best will face shippers from California, Louisiana and New Mexico.
Women, in general, are more prevalent at the track in 2017. With two days remaining on the schedule, six women have trained winners this season at Oaklawn. Lynn Chleborad trainee Chanel’s Legacy, scheduled to start from the No. 1 post in the Fantasy, has won two stakes already.
Apprentice jockey Katie Clawson earned eight of her 14 lifetime victories this season at Oaklawn in a career that began last summer in Indiana.
Chanel’s Legacy began her 3-year-old campaign with victories in Oaklawn’s Dixie Belle Stakes on Jan. 21 and Martha Washington Stakes on Feb. 11. Clearly off her game in the Grade III Honeybee Stakes on March 11, Chanel’s Legacy faded to finish sixth in a field of 11.
Chleborad started Chanel’s Legacy in the 6-furlong Purple Martin Stakes two weeks after the Honeybee, and a second-place finish left Chleborad confident in her filly’s fitness for the Fantasy.
Chleborad stood near Chanel’s Legacy’s stable as the gray filly gobbled hay Monday morning.
“I think she’s ready to go,” Chleborad said.
Chleborad is in her 31st season as a trainer, a career that began in her home state of Nebraska. Horses under
her direction have won 1,187 of 9,265 starts. She hesitated to specify differences between the acceptance women garnered in racing 30 years ago compared with today.
“I don’t want to say women weren’t respected then, but yet, well … OK, basically they weren’t respected,” Chleborad said. “You know, then it was, ‘If you’re a woman, you’re supposed to be folding clothes, doing laundry and cooking supper.’ ”
She said perceptions have improved.
“We are respected now,” Chleborad said. “We still have to prove ourselves, but it’s that way for men, too. The minute you don’t prove yourself, they’re going to go to someone else.”
Chleborad said the transient nature of horse racing does not appeal to young women as much as young men.
“In this game, you have to move every three or four months,” she said. “It’s transient, it’s hard and it’s expensive. You’re just constantly moving your stuff, and it’s not fun for long. On top of that, it’s a matter of where’s your boyfriend, or where’s your husband, or where are your kids? Well, you’re always having to say that they’re back in soand-so, and I think that’s more of a problem for women.”
Ingrid Mason is tied for ninth among trainers at Oaklawn this season with 11 wins, and she is 15th in purse earnings with $448,290. Mason said she refused to allow for limitations.
“I’ve never viewed myself as different than anyone else,” she said. “I think that’s the thing. If you view yourself as somebody different, then you’re going to get treated differently.
“You know, this business is tough on everybody. I don’t care if you’re female or male, it doesn’t matter. There are many challenges, and just the challenge in general; one day everything’s great, and the next day things happen to your horses and you just have to be resilient. It doesn’t matter what your sex is, or what your ethnic background is, or whatever.”
Clawson, a native of Mesa, Ariz., who was raised in Brazil, Ind., was introduced to racing as a result of a channel-surfing incident as a 10-year-old. Purely by chance, she landed on the TVG Network, which is dedicated to live horse racing and related programming.
“That got me started,” Clawson said. “I remembered what channel number it was, and then one day while sitting there watching it, Zenyatta happened to be running, and that was really something that gave me something to hold onto, as opposed to just being random horses that I had no idea who they were.”
Zenyatta won the 2008
Breeders’ Cup Distaff, the 2009 Breeders’ Cup Classic and was named Horse of the Year in 2010. She was inducted into the Racing Hall of Fame in 2016.
Clawson, 20, said she has heard of obstacles for women in horse racing, but they have not been part of her experience.
“I’ve had to adjust pretty greatly to being around men, who are the trainers and the bosses of everyone on the racetrack,” Clawson said, “but I haven’t really encountered anyone being like, ‘Oh, she’s a girl. I’m not going to use her,’ at least not to my face. I’m sure it’s out there, but that’s their prerogative, and I can’t change it, but I haven’t run into it.”
Clawson’s agent, Steve Krajcir, said he remembered when women jockeys were much more likely to encounter resistance.
“That card isn’t played as much as it was when they first started coming around,” Krajcir said. “There are just more women in the sport doing well, and it’s made it easier for them. Katie’s done well. Horses run for her, and people notice that. She needs to finish better. She needs to get stronger, but she will. I think she’s going to have a nice career.”
Mason said she believes her philosophy applies to everyone, regardless of gender or job title.
“We put ourselves where we want to be,” she said. “You figure out a way to get there, and you make it happen. We all decide where we want to be in life. If you decide you want to be there, then you’ll be there.”