Pedroza Back in the Saddle Again

Martin Pedroza has made more comebacks than Brett Favre, only not from retirement; from injury.

The unsinkable and resilient jockey resumed riding Sunday after missing more than four months due to a fracture of his left shin in a starting gate mishap on Feb. 7.

“I’m fit, I feel good, I want to win a race today and everybody will be talking about me,” the 48-year-old Panamanian said. “Yes, it’s frustrating overcoming these injuries and coming back, but mostly because I want to ride so much.

“When I’m hurt and recovering, I don’t even watch races until I feel I’m close to coming back. This time, I didn’t watch them until maybe a month before I was coming back. It’s frustrating because you want to be riding, but you can’t, so I just stay away from the races for a while, without even watching replays or things like that.

“When I start working out, I begin watching the races. Riding is my passion. I love what I do. I thought I’d be ready to ride again before this, but when I tried to get on horses, I was still limping, so I had to wait.”

Neither his agent for the better part of 27 years, Richie Silverstein, nor trainers, have any doubt about Pedroza’s will to win or seriousness of purpose on horseback.

“He’s very tough,” said trainer Julio Canani, a long-time Pedroza devotee who gave him a leg up on Martial Law to win the 1989 Santa Anita Handicap at 50-1.

“He works hard in the mornings. If he falls down, he gets right back up.”