Faucheux leaves training to become jockey agent

Ron Faucheux, the top trainer at Fair Grounds for three straight years, is leaving that career to become a jockey agent.

Faucheux confirmed a Thoroughbred Daily News report that he will represent Jose Luis Rodriguez, who began racing in the U.S. last year.

Faucheux told Horse Racing Nation on Wednesday that training has been become more difficult in the last few years.

"Horse racing has been great to me through the years. I've been doing it since 2009," Fauchex said. "And every year, I've done very well, money wise, basically, up until about three years ago, I started to see the swing. And then the last two years, we were pretty much just about breaking even doing it.

"But I mean, look, it's given me opportunity to buy a house in Louisiana," he said. "Really, financially I've done well, overall, through the years. It's just with the inflation in the last couple of years, it's just made it so much harder."

Faucheux is 40 and has two children, 15 and 9. "I've never even been able to take them on a vacation before. I'm young enough where I feel I can always get back into it. But there's just a lot of uncertainties with racing."

He acknowledged that he doesn't know what the future holds.

"I'm committed to this 100 percent through the Evangeline meet through the summer. And honestly, I'm really just trying to focus on that and not really think about it until the time comes."

As far as a return to training, the Horseracing Integrity and Security Authority will be a consideration, as will costs.

"I think HISA is something that I'm going watch very closely, because I'd hate to get back in the industry and if HISA's fully implemented, and have a whole bunch of start fees on top of other daily expenses," Faucheux said. "That's something that we'll watch. I mean, if there's a $200, $300 start fee, it may make it hard to come back.

"And if I do come back, whether it would be this Fair Grounds meet or 10 years down the road or whenever, I would do it differently," he said. "I would try to train less horses and obviously, bring my day rate to more comparable to the Kentucky, New York circuit-type day rate."

In the Fair Grounds meet that ended last month, Faucheux had a record of 170: 42-30-16 and earnings of $1,286,801. Brad Cox and Bret Calhoun were tied for second, each with 37 wins.

In two years of racing in the U.S., Rodriguez has compiled a record of 213: 41-38-33 and earnings of $1,309,258. In the recent Fair Grounds meet, he had 35 wins from 191 starts, ranking sixth in the jockey standings.

"He's really, really good," Faucheux said. "Really good jockey. I mean, he's just as talented as any jock I've been around."