Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
Rosario’s traveling road show moves on to Louisiana Derby
Joel Rosario is a man in demand.
Last Saturday, Rosario was at Oaklawn Park, after being at Santa Anita the previous Saturday, after being at Oaklawn the Saturday prior. He’ll head to Fair Grounds this Saturday before going to Dubai the final Saturday of the month, then return to the United States, where he’ll be at either Keeneland or Santa Anita the first Saturday in April. It’s a dizzying schedule, but that’s the demand placed on a top jockey this time of year, as the Kentucky Derby draws closer.
Every one of those trips features a Derby prep, as Rosario and his agent, Ron Anderson, try to sift through the opportunities presented and try and land on the right horse come May 1. Last Saturday, Rosario won the Rebel on Concert Tour, whom he has ridden to three victories in three starts. This week, he’ll ride Hot Rod Charlie in the Grade 2, $1 million Louisiana Derby. How horses like that perform in coming weeks will determine whom Rosario asks to the big dance.
He’s won it once previously, in 2013 with Orb, and trying to get back to that winner’s circle remains a priority.
“It was a very special moment for me,” Rosario said in a telephone conversation Tuesday, between his weekend flights. “When I was little in the Dominican Republic, I wanted to ride in the Derby, but it seemed like a dream.
“I remember watching Fusaichi Pegasus win the Derby,” he said of the 2000 Derby, when he would have been 15, “so it’s very special for me, because I never in my life back then thought it would happen to me. It’s so famous, so important. So to go and win, it was very special. Crossing the wire, I couldn’t have been happier that moment. It was like a dream. We work for that.”
Rosario, 36, long ago solidified his position as one of the top riders in the country, but he has yet to win an Eclipse Award. He has a lengthy list of major stakes wins among his 3,058 career victories. In addition to the Derby, he has won a pair of Belmonts, and owns 13 Breeders’ Cup scores, tying him for fifth all-time. He’s won the Dubai World Cup, and races at Royal Ascot. Last year, he led the nation in Grade 1 wins.
Rosario has finished no worse than sixth in annual earnings for each of the past 12 years, three times – including 2020 – finishing second. His mounts have purse earnings of more than $236 million, 12th all-time, and less than $1 million behind Laffit Pincay Jr., the great Hall of Fame rider to whom Rosario is most compared. Like Pincay, Rosario can finesse a horse along on the front end, but, like Pincay, his greatest attribute is his ability to overpower a recalcitrant horse with little or no use of the whip.
Concert Tour and Hot Rod Charlie are contrasts in style. Concert Tour has sharp speed, and it was up to Rosario to appropriately dole it out.
“He ran very well for the first time going long,” Rosario said. “He’s a really nice horse. He seemed like he was happy with the way I was riding him, so I just stayed with that style and he performed very well. He responded to everything I asked him to do.”
The late-running Hot Rod Charlie needs a little more help from the rider, and that’s one of the reasons Rosario has familiarized himself with the colt in recent morning works at Santa Anita.
It’s Rosario’s unflappability, also similar to Pincay’s, that stands out.
“He’s been put in the pressure pot and he handles it well,” said trainer Bob Baffert, who matched Rosario with Concert Tour. “He’s a very calm, coolheaded guy. He’ll come to the paddock, I’ll tell him the horse is ready, he’ll give that little laugh, and off he goes. Horses run for him. He’s strong. He’s a great athlete.”
“He’s an A-plus,” said Leandro Mora, the longtime assistant to trainer Doug O’Neill. Hot Rod Charlie runs this week in Mora’s name owing to O’Neill serving a brief suspension when entries were taken last Saturday. “He makes everybody happy.”
Rosario has ridden in the Derby nine times in the last 11 years, and only missed last year’s race when protocols for riders caused by the pandemic resulted in he and Anderson deciding to remain at Saratoga for better opportunities closing weekend rather than settle for a Derby longshot. Rosario won three stakes the final four days of that meet, including a Hopeful victory on Jackie’s Warrior.
It was Jackie’s Warrior in last month’s Southwest who began this current streak of Rosario being in Derby preps every Saturday. Jackie’s Warrior that day showed he’s not cut out for the Derby trail. The search continued. Concert Tour remains a top candidate. Hot Rod Charlie puts in his bid Saturday. He’s trying to find the right partner for the big dance, and right now Rosario isn’t sitting out a single song.