Fab Five Favored in Legends Race

Odds have been set for the second-annual Legends Race at Arlington Park Friday, Aug. 12 pitting five legends of the saddles versus the top five riders in Arlington’s jockey standings in the “Arlington Fab Five vs. Legends” Jockey Challenge Wager.

Arlington’s Fab Five – Jozbin Santana, James Graham, Eduardo Perez, E. T. Baird and Junior Alvarado – has been pegged as the 2-5 morning line favorite  in the special wager buoyed by Baird’s mount aboard Charles Sigrist & Del Sol Farm’s Lucky Gal, the 7-2 morning line favorite in the one-mile turf race for $15,000 claimers.

The Legends – Hall of Famers Earlie Fires and Chris McCarron; two-time Arlington champion Mark Guidry; Patti Cooksey, at one time the leading female rider in races won; and 1977 Triple Crown winning jockey 72-year-old Jean Cruguet – is 7-5 in the morning line.

The lowest single morning-line odds on a Legends’ horse is 4-1 on the Cruguet-ridden Raillery, owned by Gregory Carlevale and trained by Lisa Merritt.  Should he win the race, it is believed that Cruguet will become the oldest jockey to win a sanctioned betting race.

The Jockey Challenge Wager is a $2 Win wager on the group the bettor thinks will earn more points based on a scale that awards 12 points for first, 10 points for second, seven points for third, six points for fourth and four points for fifth.

In last year’s inaugural jockey challenge, led by Inez Karlsson, who won the race aboard Saint Leon, Team Arlington (called the “Young Guns”) outscored the Legends (called the “Cagey Veterans”) by a count of 25-14.