Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
Hamilton has Eclipse hopes
Maryland jockey Weston Hamilton’s five-pound apprentice weight allowance expired Dec. 22, but it shouldn’t slow him much. He’s looked like a journeyman for a long time now.
Hamilton, 20, made good use of his apprenticeship, winning 126 races – eight in 2017 and 118 this year. He has mount earnings in 2018 of $3.4 million and is a cinch to be named an Eclipse Awards finalist for apprentice rider.
“I would love to win it,” Hamilton said. “It’s been one of my goals all year long. I try not to think about it too much.”
Hamilton has more than held his own in a deep Maryland Jockey Club riding colony that includes veterans Jevian Toledo, Jorge Vargas Jr., Feargal Lynch, Horacio Karamanos, Julian Pimentel, and Victor Carrasco, the Eclipse Awardwinning apprentice of 2013. Trevor McCarthy rejoined the local riding ranks in September.
Hamilton finished a close second in Laurel Park’s winter meet standings. He tied for second at the Laurel summer meet, and is in a four-way battle for second at the Laurel fall stand, which concludes Monday.
He has won four races in a day three times this year and has had five three-wins days. Hamilton is a decisive rider, a strong finisher, and does not hesitate to come up the rail.
One of Hamilton’s biggest supporters is Dale Capuano, who has trained in Maryland since 1981 and has 3,405 wins. Capuano and Hamilton are 44 for 155 this year, a win average of 28 percent.
“He’s my kind of rider, very aggressive, especially for an apprentice,” Capuano said. “He’s out every morning and will jog them, gallop them, work them, whatever you want him to do.”
Capuano singled out the fifth race at Belmont Park on Sept. 19 as one of Hamilton’s better rides.
Hamilton was aboard Capuano’s first-time starter Strive for a Cure, who dropped well back early in the New Yorkbred maiden race. Strive for a Cure began to advance on the far turn, and Hamilton sent him through a tight opening along the rail entering the stretch. Hamilton came up inside the front-running leader in midstretch with Strive for a Cure and they went on to win by 1 1/4 lengths. The ground he saved likely was the difference between winning and losing.
“For an apprentice, riding for the first time at Belmont Park, it was impressive,” Capuano said.
Hamilton is the son of jockey Steve “Cowboy” Hamilton, a winner of 1,376 races who also competes in Maryland but is currently recuperating from back surgery.
“My father taught me so much,” Wes Hamilton said. “He also got me mentally ready to ride. I ask him stuff all the time and he gives me his best advice.”
Hamilton, who grew up in Kiefer, Okla., about 30 minutes outside Tulsa, said one of his biggest thrills came in late September when he won his first stakes, which came aboard the Capuano-trained Come Sundown in the First State Dash at Delaware Park.
“A lot of my family was at Delaware that day,” Hamilton said. “My aunt and uncle on my Dad’s side were there. My brother Garrett was in from Oklahoma. It was a big deal.”
Although he grew up in a rural area, Hamilton has adjusted well to life on the East Coast.
“I like both places even though they are very different,” Hamilton said. “If I’m in Oklahoma, I’m hunting and fishing. It’s hard being away from my family, who I love so much, but I’m staying in Maryland. All I want to do is keep riding.”
Leatherbury on hiatus
Hall of Fame horseman King Leatherbury won’t be training this winter and Laurel Park has named an April stakes in his honor – but don’t assume he is retiring.
“I’ve heard the rumors, but there’s nothing official,” Leatherbury said. “I won’t make any decisions until the spring.”
Leatherbury, 85, has been racing horses since 1958 and is the fifth-winningest trainer of all time in North America, with 6,501 victories. He was the nation’s leading trainer by wins in 1976 and 1977 and won at least 200 races for 11 years in a row from 1974 to 1984.
But Leatherbury’s business has slowed, and he hasn’t won 50 races in a year since 2013. This year he is 9 for 80.
“My horses have kind of fizzled, and a trainer without horses really isn’t a trainer,” he said.
Leatherbury explained he was down to four horses and then an owner left him, leaving him with a pair of 2-yearolds. Auld Lange Syne finished seventh at Laurel on Wednesday in a maiden race. He plans to run the other one more time and then put them both away for the winter.
While his stable isn’t doing well, Leatherbury is blessed with good health and it is premature to count him out.
“I’m very fortunate,” he said. “There’s nothing wrong with me. My mind’s not too bad and I’ve always said, first you lose your mind, then your money, then your friends.”
Leatherbury is the lone survivor of the “Big Four,” who dominated Maryland racing in the 1970s. Bud Delp died in December 2006. Dick Dutrow (1999) and John Tammaro (2001) went before Delp.
Leatherbury had a career renaissance this decade with Ben’s Cat, whom he bred, owned, and trained.
Ben’s Cat won 32 of 63 starts and earned more than $2.6 million between 2010 and the summer of 2017, becoming a Mid-Atlantic legend along the way and cementing Leatherbury’s place in the Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 2015.