Cenicola in fight for his life

Thirty years ago, in his heyday as exercise rider for the stars of the Ron McAnally stable, Lewis Cenicola could be heard singing, “You are the sunshine of my life . . .” as he made his way to the track, in a voice that tiptoed a dangerous line between Stevie Wonder and Joe Pesci.

“I think that’s when I fell for him,” said Donna Cenicola, then Donna Hudson, working at the time for T.J. Kelly. “Then I heard him singing the same thing to other exercise girls.”

Cenicola smiled.

“I was singing to the horses,” he said.

And what horses they were. Pay Tribute, Super Moment, Syncopate, Soft Victory, Cruiser, An Act, Queen to Be, Drama Critic – all major stakes winners from the early chapters of McAnally’s Hall of Fame portfolio, and all of them guided through their most important mornings by Cenicola.