Smith Collects Second Shoemaker Award
Propelled
by three wins over the two-day Breeders’ Cup World Championships, Mike
Smith won his second consecutive Bill Shoemaker Award as the most
outstanding jockey of the 30th edition of the event, held at Santa Anita Park, Nov. 1-2.
Smith
scored back-to-back victories in the Breeders’ Cup Marathon on London
Bridge and Outstrip (GB) in the Juvenile Turf on Friday, and was
victorious aboard Mizdirection in the Geico Turf Sprint on Saturday,
extending his all-time lead in Breeders’ Cup victories by a jockey to
20. Combined with a second-place finish on Laugh Track in the Xpressbet
Sprint, a third-place finish on Emollient in the Filly & Mare Turf
and a fourth-place finish on Royal Delta in the Distaff, Smith’s
37-point total edged Gary Stevens by four points in a 10-5-3-1 scoring
system based on the first- through fourth-place finishes in the 14
Breeders’ Cup races.
Stevens,
50, enjoying a remarkable return to the races after a seven-year
absence, booted home winners in the Breeders’ Cup Distaff with Beholder
and the Classic on Mucho Macho Man. He was awarded five points for
finishing second in the Juvenile Fillies on She’s a Tiger, following a
disqualification from first place; and earned another second-place
finish on Havana in the Juvenile and a third-place finish on Indy Point
in the Turf.
The
Bill Shoemaker Award is named in honor of one of the greatest jockeys
in the history of Thoroughbred racing. Shoemaker, a winner of the
Kentucky Derby four times, won more than 8,800 races in a career that
spanned more than 40 years. In 1987, at 56, Shoemaker won the Breeders’
Cup Classic aboard Ferdinand.
“It
was a great honor to win the award last year for the first time but
winning it a second time means much more to me because it’s so much
harder to do,” said the 48-year-old Smith, from Roswell, N.M.
Commenting on the late Shoemaker, Smith said “As small as he was, he was
a giant of a man on horseback and off.”
Bill Shoemaker Award winners:
2003: Alex Solis
2004: John Velazquez
2005: Garrett Gomez
2006: Frankie Dettori
2007: Garrett Gomez
2008: Garrett Gomez
2009: Julien Leparoux
2010: Garrett Gomez
2011: John Velazquez
2012: Mike Smith
2013 Mike Smith