Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
Saldana couldn’t make weight but is now making the grade
CYPRESS, Calif. – Reed Saldana may be the only jockey in racing history to ride the winner of a Grade 3 Quarter Horse race at Yavapai Downs in Arizona and a Thoroughbred race at Aqueduct three months apart, way back in 2008.
Those were two of his 37 winners in 611 mounts in a fiveyear career from 2007 to 2011.
“I wasn’t very good,” Saldana recalled on Wednesday. “I couldn’t make the weight.”
A decade later, some of those riding memories have faded, replaced by Saldana’s recent success as a trainer on the rise in Southern California. Through Wednesday, Saldana had won with 14 of 70 starters this year for a healthy 20 percent winning average.
The most recent win was the biggest surprise – Shades of Victory at 80-1 in the $75,000 E.B. Johnston Stakes for California-bred milers at Los Alamitos last Saturday.
After the race, Saldana was the first to admit Shades of Victory was entered in the Johnston out of necessity. A week earlier, while watching a post parade trackside at Del Mar, Saldana was visiting with trainer Peter Miller when the conversation veered toward the horses they had nominated for the Johnston.
“I’ve got nowhere else to run,” Saldana told Miller.
Shades of Victory, the longest shot in a field of seven, led throughout the Johnston Stakes, holding off the statebred stakes winners B Squared and Edwards Going Left in the final furlong.
Shades of Victory was Saldana’s first official stakes winner, though he worked closely with his wife, trainer Melissa Saldana, when Cuddle Alert won the Spring Fever Stakes at Santa Anita in February 2017. At the time, Melissa Saldana was also assisting Mark Glatt.
Cuddle Alert ran in Reed Saldana’s name following that race and was later third in the Grade 3 L.A. Woman Stakes at Santa Anita last October.
Shades of Victory and Cuddle Alert, who was retired earlier this year, both were claimed by the Saldanas.
Shades of Victory was claimed by Reed Saldana for $12,500 at Golden Gate Fields in April and won an optional claimer for California-breds at Santa Anita in June. A 4-year-old, Shades of Victory has earned $89,307 since being claimed.
“I knew he’d be better when I stretched him out,” said Saldana, who owns Shades of Victory. “I never expected that performance. That was a shocker in a good way.”
Saldana, 36, grew up around Hollywood Park. His father, Adolfo, was a groom for trainers Randy Bradshaw, D. Wayne Lukas, and Mike Puype, and these days occasionally works for Melissa, who is an assistant trainer for John Martin at Santa Anita.
Saldana rode primarily in Arizona and California but did spend some time in New York.
“It’s very different,” Saldana said. “It was a culture shock for me. I’ve always been in California.”
After he quit riding, Saldana worked for several trainers, including Steve Sherman, Dean Pederson, and Glatt, before he and wife began their operation in 2016. They now work separately.
Saldana is based at Los Alamitos and has a 15-horse stable. Three of Saldana’s starters were claimed from him in the final days of the Del Mar meet, which ended Sept. 3.
“That’s part of the game,” he said. “That’s what I do, too. It’s no shocker.
“I enjoy the claiming game. You do a lot of homework. You have to make sure what you’re claiming.”
On Friday at Los Alamitos, Saldana starts Princess Kendra in a starter allowance at a mile. Princess Kendra, owned by Saldana’s 10-year-old son, Tristran, won an $8,000 claimer at Del Mar on July 20 and was second in a starter allowance at Los Alamitos last Saturday. She has won twice this year for Saldana.
Saldana exercises Princess Kendra, as he does many of his horses.
“I feel like I’m a better rider in the morning than in the afternoon,” he said. “I get on most of them. You can only tell so much when you see one gallop.”
The experience of those years as a rider has paid dividends.
“I don’t regret it,” he said. “It’s a tough life. It’s demanding on the body.
“I’ve only been out on my own for a year and a half. I feel fortunate with the success I’ve had.”