Breakthrough year: Women trainers become major players

Jena Antonucci earned a triumph that will resonate for generations when Arcangelo captured the 155th Belmont Stakes, making her the first woman to train the winner of a Triple Crown race.

Linda Rice, after topping the standings in a succession of New York meets, set the record for victories in a single season on that rugged circuit when she recorded her 165th victory at Aqueduct on New Year’s Eve.

Brittany Russell, in only her fourth full season, emerged as the first woman to lead Maryland’s year-end trainer standings with 118 wins between Laurel Park and Pimlico. Claudio Gonzalez had maintained a grip on that title since 2017.

Cherie DeVaux stamped herself as yet another rising female star when she set career highs with 56 victories and $5,558,777 in earnings in 2023. She more than doubled her earnings total of the season before.

After years of toiling with relatively small stables in virtual anonymity, can it be that women are finally ready to make a considerable mark on an industry notoriously slow to accept change? Or will they be unable to back up last year’s breakthroughs?

Antonucci is confident that her ground-breaking success and that of others signals things to come. “I don’t find it to be an anomaly,” she said. “I find it to be a fair representation of work that has always been done.”

Rice, 59, had been steadily building toward her record success. She traces her ability to surpass David Jacobson’s mark of 164 wins, which had stood since 2013, to a critical decision she made that same year. She opted to race in her home state of New York year-round to capitalize on its hefty purses.

“That’s been a big part of it,” she said. “I felt we should concentrate on New York racing and the things you do well.”

Another pivotal move was her decision about five years ago to play the claiming game in earnest. “That was due to financial restraints at auctions,” Rice said. She consistently found herself without the spending power to bring home prospects she wanted most.

Working with horses obtained from the claiming ranks requires extreme patience. “You’re going to find horses that need time. A horse that’s lame. A horse that needs a chip removed from an ankle. A horse that needs time off for mild pneumonia,” she noted.

Rice provides them with the time they need to run effectively again.

She also has demonstrated a keen eye for spotting claiming horses with ability and then identifying sources for improvement. “Certainly, in the claiming game, if you are going to run them where they can win, you are going to lose a lot of horses,” she said. “But you just have to have the confidence that you will replace them.”

Rice does such a good job of replenishing her stock that she has become a woman for all seasons. She was NYRA’s leading trainer last winter, she captured Belmont Park’s spring-summer stand, she pulled out a tie with Chad Brown at Saratoga and showed the way at Aqueduct last fall.

“The year-end total was nice, but winning the Belmont meet and managing to pull up in the last two days to tie the Saratoga meet, that would be what has meant the most to me,” she said.

In discussing her accomplishments, Rice recalled that her father, Clyde, was somewhat skeptical years ago when she told him of her ambition to emulate his career.

“Well, it would be a lot easier if you were one of my sons,” he told her.

She would not be dissuaded.

“He was just looking out for my best interests at that time,” she said. “He certainly believed those words to be true and, frankly, he was probably correct. He was right about a lot of things.”

Russell, 34, and DeVaux, 41, show every sign of joining Antonucci and Rice as major players for years to come. Russell ranked 11th nationally with 177 victories overall and 16th with $7,996,867 in earnings. DeVaux took out her trainer’s license in 2018 after almost eight years as an assistant to Brown. She comes off a career-high 56 wins. She ranked 25th nationally in earnings, which included a third-place effort by She Feels Pretty in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf.

Jockey Sheldon Russell said of his wife’s soaring fortunes, “She’s not only training horses and going there when they run, but we’re growing two kids as well. No one works harder. She deserves all of the success she’s having.” Their children are Edy, 4, and Rye, 2.

Antonucci has spent considerable time since the Belmont speaking to young girls about what the future can hold for them if they have a passion for horses, understand the nature of running a business and are willing to work hard. She is confident the past season will have a lasting impact.

“I think there will be a constant exposure to successful women,” she said.