Leading California jockey Prat 'to expand his profile' in New York

One of the nation’s leading trainers has called Flavien Prat a difference maker, as in difference maker when it comes to winning or losing a race.

That’s a supreme but deserved compliment for the 25-year-old Frenchman, currently poised to win Santa Anita’s Spring Meet riding title, as he leads co-runners-up Joe Talamo and Geovanni Franco, 30-24, with six racing days remaining.

But Prat and his agent, Derek Lawson, are not content with the status quo and envision bigger and better things in the future.

“The goal is to expand his profile, not only here, because we’re pretty well known in Southern California, obviously, but now to branch out to New York,” Lawson said. “We want the New York trainers and owners to watch the way he rides on a daily basis in their own backyard.

“That’s the reason we’ve decided to go to New York for at least two weeks. He has potential stakes mounts in New York coming up in the next 10 days.

“After that, we regroup, come back to California, possibly ride the Los Alamitos Derby if we find a horse we can ride there, then move to Del Mar and try to win the riding title again like we did last year.

“That’s our goal for the next month and a half, two months.”