Manny Franco wins Aqueduct fall meet, NYRA 2023 riding titles

Manny Franco paced all riders at the Aqueduct fall meet to not only claim the riding title at the 31-day meeting with 37 wins but also cement his place atop the New York Racing Association’s yearly jockey standings for the third time with 238 wins across the circuit’s six meets.

Franco, 29, celebrated five stakes scores at the Big A fall meet in the Grade 3 Pebbles with Implicated, the Comely (G3) with Raging Sea, the Tepin with Memorialize, the New York Stallion Stakes Series Great White Way with Antonio of Venice and the Alex M. Robb with Dr Ardito. In all, Franco, who is represented by agent John Panagot, posted a 198: 37-32-31 record with $2,699,549 in earnings at the fall meet, good for an 18.69 win percentage and in-the-money rate of 50.51 percent.

Click here for Aqueduct entries and results.

Franco expressed his gratitude for trainer Chad Brown, who trains three of Franco’s five stakes winners at the meet.

“He’s been a great help for me all year,” Franco said. “For the past five or six years, he’s helped me a lot. I want to say thanks to him and to his owners for giving me the opportunity to ride those kinds of horses.”

Among Franco’s favorite wins at the meet was the Alex M. Robb aboard Brown-trained Dr Ardito, whom he has ridden in all but one of his 14 starts.

“He means a lot. He’s always going to be in my heart, and I ride him in almost all his races,” Franco said. “He’s part of my career, and I’m happy to be on him.”

José Lezcano finished second with 24 wins at the meet, and Kendrick Carmouche took third with 23.

Franco’s Big A fall-meet victory added to a stellar season for the native of Carolina, Puerto Rico, who completed his year with a NYRA record of 1,219: 238-196-180 and earnings of $17,329,576. Franco, who also was NYRA’s year-end leading rider in 2018 and 2019, was the top jockey at three other NYRA meetings this year, claiming the Aqueduct winter with 63 wins, Aqueduct spring with 37 and Belmont at the Big A fall with 34.

Among Franco’s 28 NYRA stakes wins were Grade 2 scores in the Sheepshead Bay with Higher Truth, Bowling Green with Channel Maker and Ballston Spa with Evvie Jets and Grade 3 triumphs in the Withers with Hit Show, Bold Ruler with Durante as well as the Pebbles and Comely.

Franco also demonstrated his commitment to his mounts when notching multiple stakes victories on the year with horses like Dr Ardito in the Haynesfield, Evan Shipman Handicap and Alex M. Robb; Law Professor in the Queens County and Excelsior; and Spirit of St Louis in the Ashley T. Cole and Mohawk.

“I feel great, and I feel blessed,” Franco said. “It’s not easy to do this in this kind of colony of great riders, and I’m just thankful for all the support of the trainers and owners (and) my agent. And I’m proud of myself.”

Franco added his successes are thanks in great part to Panagot.

“We’ll just keep with the same mind in the new year and work hard with my agent,” Franco said. “I think that’s key, to have a lot of communication. I think that helps it a lot and to be here day in and day out.”

Irad Ortiz Jr. claimed second in the year-end standings with 168 wins, and José Ortiz finished third with 154 wins.

Linda Rice won Sunday’s second race with George’s Vice to earn a record 165th training win on the NYRA circuit for 2023. She captured her first year-end title with a record of 705: 165-122-107, adding to a banner year that saw her finish as leading trainer at 5-of-6 NYRA meetings including the Aqueduct winter with 37 wins, spring with 17 and fall with 20; Belmont spring-summer with 34; and Saratoga, where she closed a five-win deficit on the final two days to tie Chad Brown for top honors with 35 wins each. She completed the year with $10,375,322 in earnings at NYRA.

“I was really excited about winning the Belmont meet this year. I tied Todd (Pletcher) for the Belmont meet in 2011, but to win it outright was really special, because that’s the very marquee meet,” Rice said. “And then to come back and tie at Saratoga, that was probably the most exciting meet of my career. To be five down and pull it off and get the tie, that was amazing. What are we going to do for fun next?”

Rice, 59, sent out 11 horses to stakes scores on the NYRA circuit this season, including graded wins with Joey Freshwater in the Bay Shore (G3) and Mommasgottarun in the Distaff Handicap (G3) along with stakes winners Amanda’s Folly in the Ticonderoga, Betsy Blue in the Interborough, Downtown Mischief in the Bouwerie and Cicada, El Grande O in the Bertram F. Bongard and Sleepy Hollow, Hot Fudge in the Garland of Roses, Ichiban in the Fleet Indian, Les Bon Temps in the NYSSS Park Avenue, Pioneering Spirit in the Bernard Baruch and Knickerbocker and Runaway Rumour in the John F. Hettinger.

“I run a lot of horses in allowance races, claiming races, maiden races, some stakes,” Rice said. “We’re always hoping to cut off the bottom end and improve the top end, and I think over the course of the last maybe eight years, we’ve done that.”

Chad Brown with 132 wins and Todd Pletcher with 82 finished second and third in the NYRA year-end trainer standings.

Rice closed out her career-best year with one more training title at NYRA, posting 20 wins to finish on top at the Big A fall meet over Brown with 17 wins and Rudy Rodríguez with 16. Highlights of the meet for Rice included a stakes victory with Hot Fudge in the $120,000 Garland of Roses as well as a pair of allowance-level wins with the in-form Ain’t Broke. She completed the meeting with a record of 112: 20-18-14 and earnings of $1,157,905, good for a win rate of 17.86 percent and an in-the-money rate of 46.43 percent.

Rice also tied Klaravich Stables for leading owner at the fall meet with seven wins each. As an owner, Rice’s victories include a pair of scores with Kunshan Bridge in a Dec. 1 starter allowance and a Friday claiming tilt. She posted a record of 23: 7-3-4 with $236,026 in earnings.

Sanford Goldfarb finished third in the fall-meet owners standings with six wins. 

Seth Klarman’s Klaravich Stables finished the year as NYRA’s leading owner for a fifth consecutive time, completing the season with a record of 235: 62-39-33 and total purse earnings of $6,408,466. Their tremendous season included 15 stakes wins at NYRA led by Grade 1 triumphs at Belmont Park with Marketsegmentation in the New York and at Saratoga with Program Trading in the Saratoga Derby Invitational and Randomized in the Alabama.

Klaravich Stables’ additional stakes victories came in the Glens Falls (G2) with McKulick, Beldame (G2) with Randomized, Beaugay (G3) with Marketsegmentation, Lake George (G3) with Surge Capacity and Waya (G3) with McKulick as well as the Ruthless with Interpolate, Gander with Neural Network, Wilton with Randomized, De La Rose with Technical Analysis, Noble Damsel with Gerrymander, Athenia with Technical Analysis and Awad with Move to Gold.

Michael Dubb landed second in the year-end standings with 33 wins, and Rice finished third with 31 wins.

At the Big A fall meet, Klaravich Stables’ tie with Rice gave them their 25th owners’ title at a NYRA meeting and fifth this year when posting seven wins, a record of 31: 7-2-2 and $427,273 in earnings. Their wins included a strong allowance triumph with Brown-trained and Franco-piloted Aggregation in November and maiden scores with promising juvenile fillies Dynamic Pricing and Regulatory Risk.