Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
DePaz barn set up for strong 2021 season in New York
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Trainer Horacio DePaz felt he was just starting to make an impact in New York when the COVID-19 pandemic put a halt to racing on this circuit last March.
DePaz finished 2020 in New York with 14 winners from 61 starters, including a victory in the Grade 3 Go for Wand with Sharp Starr.
DePaz, who has been based in the Mid-Atlantic region, hopes to find more success in New York in 2021 and appears to have the ammunition to do that this winter. He sent out his first starter of the year, Devilish Mood, in Friday’s ninth race at Aqueduct and will have one of the favorites in Sunday’s $100,000 La Verdad Stakes in Sharp Starr.
“We had a good Belmont meet after COVID,” DePaz said Friday in between sets of workers. “Saratoga was good, then it quieted down for the [fall] Belmont meet, but then we’re picking back up again at Aqueduct. We got good owners, which makes it easier. Hopefully no pandemic hits again and we’ll be all right.”
One of DePaz’s primary owners is Barry Schwartz, who owns Sharp Starr as well as Amundson, who won the Hollie Hughes here in February after winning two races at the 2019 Belmont fall meet.
Amundson was given a break following his seventh-place finish in the John Morrissey Stakes at Saratoga in August and is training toward a potential start in the Hollie Hughes next month.
“Off that race at Saratoga we just gave him a break,” DePaz said. “He tries hard every time. We figured we’d get him ready for the winter. He had his first half-mile last weekend. He’ll move forward off of that.”
DePaz also has Fed Funds and Singapore Trader to run this winter. Singapore Trader is a half-brother to Grade 1 winner Voodoo Song. DePaz has another member of that family, the unraced 3-year-old filly Voodoo Magic, who is a full sister to Singapore Trader and whom he hopes to start this winter.
“She was precocious and she was coming along nicely, and then she had a setback in the middle of the summer and we weren’t able to move forward,” DePaz said. “She had time off for that. Now she’s just come back.”
DePaz also has a promising 3-year-old New York-bred maiden for Schwartz in Our Man Mike, who has twice finished second in stakes. He was scratched from a recent maiden race due to a splint issue, but should return later this winter or spring.
Couples must be coupled
Jockeys Trevor McCarthy and Katie Davis are a couple in more ways than one.
McCarthy and Davis were married in December. Both have moved their tack from Maryland to Aqueduct for the winter. Under a New York State Gaming Commission rule, when the two are riding horses in the same race in New York, those horses will be coupled in the wagering. That includes stakes races.
On Friday, both rode in the same race twice. On Saturday, they were scheduled to ride against each other three times. On Sunday, they both have mounts in races 3, 4, and 9.
The rule, 4025.10 (f), states: “All horses trained or ridden by a spouse, parent, issue or member of a jockey’s household shall be coupled in the betting with any horse ridden by such jockey.”
Braulio Baeza Jr., the gaming commission steward, said the rule “has to do with joint finances.”
Maryland, where McCarthy and Davis rode against each other multiple times while engaged, does not have such a rule.
Baeza said the gaming commission rule does not apply to brothers, such as Irad Ortiz Jr. and Jose Ortiz, because they do not live in the same household. Also, the rule does not apply when a child of trainer Robbie Davis is riding a horse for another trainer in a race in which he is also running one with a different rider because Davis’s children are considered emancipated from him.
NYRA leaders for 2020
Jockey Jose Ortiz, trainer Chad Brown, and owner Seth Klarman led their respective categories in wins on the New York Racing Association circuit in 2020.
Ortiz won 142 races from 707 mounts in 2020 at NYRA tracks – Aqueduct, Belmont, and Saratoga – finishing five wins in front of Jose Lezcano. Manny Franco (129), Irad Ortiz Jr. (125), and Eric Cancel (108) complete the top five.
Ortiz, who led all jockeys in purse money won in 2020 at NYRA tracks with $9,629,008, was also the leading rider on the NYRA circuit by wins in 2016.
Brown led all trainers in wins with 91, the sixth consecutive year he was NYRA’s leading trainer. His $7,470,893 in purse money won also led all trainers. Todd Pletcher (81), Rudy Rodriguez (67), Christophe Clement (67), and Linda Rice (62) were in the top five.
Seth Klarman’s Klaravich Stables led all owners in wins with 48 and purse money won with $3,239,041. Following Klaravich were Repole Stable (34), Michael Dubb (31), and Drawing Away Stable (26).