Jockey

Being a jockey is more than a career, it's a way of life. The glitz and glamour of the show may belie all the time and effort that goes into it, but the life of a jockey entails a great deal of risk, personal sacrifice and hardship. Often viewed as second-rate athletes, partly because of their small size, these riders are in actuality some of the toughest men in the athletic world. Pound for pound, they are unmatched in physical prowess. Controlling and guiding large thoroughbreds requires a great deal of strength and skill. In addition, there is little room for error during the close-run, high-speed races where the necessity of implementing a winning strategy makes the sport mentally as well as physically taxing. This volume provides an in-depth look at the self-employed, independent contractor known as the jockey and the all-encompassing culture of the race track he calls home. The book details the qualities and abilities of the successful jockey, the transitory nature of horse racing, the jockey's constant battle regarding weight, the financial motivation of the sport and the close-knit nature of the profession. Interviews with over 100 jockeys including Hall of Famers Pat Day, Earlie Fires and Russell Baze, add a personal focus and give the reader an inside glimpse into the world of horse racing. The last chapter includes brief biographical sketches of the most influential riders from the last 50 years.

With stunningly vibrant illustrations by Coretta Scott King Awardwinner Jerome Lagarrigue, Perfect Timing tells the story of Isaac Murphy, the grandson of slaves who escaped a life of labor and poverty by turning a chance offer to ride a horse into one of the most successful jockey careers in the history of racing. Many of Isaac's records remain unbroken today. Filled with paintings that capture the excitement, tension, and movement of a horse race, Perfect Timing is a winning combination of sports, biography, and the inspiring story of an African American who made racing history.

CCBC’s Best Books for Kids & Teens (Fall 2016) — Commended 2016 VOYA Top Shelf Fiction Selection A teen girl’s quest to find her mother leads her to the big city, and gives her the courage to fulfill her dream of becoming a jockey. Evangeline “Evie” Gibb lives a seemingly charmed life on a thoroughbred racehorse farm. But in reality, Evie feels alone in the world, cheered only by the affection of a racehorse named No Justice. She’s always been told that her mother, Angela Parson, is dead. Then, on her sixteenth birthday, a card arrives from her great aunt Mary with the suggestion that Angela might still be alive — and Evie’s life is turned upside down. In hopes of winning enough money to leave her hateful father and find her mother, Evie enters the Caledon Horse Race. But something she overhears her father say changes everything, and Evie steals the racehorse in the night and runs away. With a stray dog named Magpie at her side and help from Aunt Mary, Evie unearths long-hidden family secrets, finds unexpected love, and takes the racing world by storm.

Containing full pedigree of all the imported thorough-bred stallions and mares, with their produce.

Most children growing up cannot say their fathers were jockeys who rode race horses for a living. With that profession comes excitement, privilege, community status, and a vast array of Hall of Fame athletes and a host of trainers, agents, stable workers and jockeys frequently visiting the home. That was the life author Tracey Cooper and her siblings experienced. But while adoring fans cheered her father across the finish line, her mother was beating her and her six siblings within an inch of their lives. They endured her unbelievable anger, resentment, and negative energy until they were able to leave. In Coopers home, the abusive events were oddly intertwined with the very public aspect of the professional sport of kings and the sheer excitement and magnitude of the horse racing industry. In Jockey Daughter, she shares a poignant, firsthand look at the personal side of horse racing and the secreted physical abuse that happens in so many families regardless of their economic status. For Cooper and her brothers and sisters, the abuse was a hushed secret, and no one, except for a few, attempted to stop it.

The first Japanese American jockey, Kokomo Joe burst like a comet on the American horse-racing scene in the summer of 1941. As war with Japan loomed, Yoshio ?Kokomo Joe? Kobuki won race after race, stirring passions far beyond merely the envy and antagonism of other jockeys. His is a story of the American dream catapulting headlong into the nightmare of a nation gripped by wartime hysteria and xenophobia. The story that unfolds in Kokomo Joe is at once inspiring, deeply sad, and richly ironic?and remarkably relevant in our own climate of nationalist fervor and racial profiling. ø Sent to Japan from Washington State after his mother and three siblings died of the Spanish flu, Kobuki continued to nurse his dream of the American good life. Because of his small stature, his ambition steered him to a future as a star jockey. John Christgau narrates Kobuki?s rise from lowly stable boy to reigning star at California fairs and in the bush leagues. He describes how, at the height of the jockey?s fame, even his flight into the Sonora Desert could not protect him from the government?s espionage and sabotage dragnet. And finally he recounts how, after three years of internment, Kokomo Joe tried to reclaim his racing success, only to fall victim to still-rampant racism, a career-ending injury, and cancer.

Bill Hartack won the Kentucky Derby five times, and seemed to hate every moment. "If only Bill could have gotten along with people the way he got along with horses," a trainer said. His impoverished upbringing didn't help: his mother was killed in an automobile accident; the family home burned down; his father was murdered by a girlfriend; and he was estranged from his sisters for most of his life. Larry King, his friend, said it was just as well Hartack never married, because it wouldn't have lasted. Hartack was one of racing's most accomplished jockeys. But he was an inveterate grouch and gave the press a hard time. At 26, he was inducted into the Hall of Fame. Whenever the media tried to bury him, he would win another Derby. At the end of his life, he was found alone in a cabin in the Texas hinterlands. Drawn from dozens of interviews and conversations with family members, friends and enemies, this book provides a full account of Hartack's turbulent life.