Clark closing in on 3,000 wins

Jockey Kerwin Clark hit a career high in 2015 when he won the Kentucky Oaks with Lovely Maria. Another milestone was looming for the 57-year-old on Wednesday night, as the race week opened at Delta Downs in Vinton, La.

Clark entered the card one win from 3,000 career Thoroughbred victories in North America, according to Equibase. He had a chance at hitting the mark in the seventh race and, if not, could get there later in the week. He had two mounts Thursday night and will be aboard three runners on Friday.

Clark launched his career in 1975 at the now-shuttered Jefferson Downs near New Orleans. He has competed at tracks throughout North America as well as in Saudi Arabia, where he won hundreds of races while spending four years under contract for the late King Abdullah. But for Clark, the defining moment of his career remains his teaming with Lovely Maria in the Kentucky Oaks.

“The last eighth of a mile, when she started stepping away, I was like, ‘This is going to happen,’ ” Clark recalled in an interview Tuesday. “What an unbelievable experience. To have so many people watching on a day like that, and to win a race of that caliber after being in this game 40 years, it was a dream come true.”

Clark is cut from the same cloth as the many nationally prominent riders produced by Louisiana. Born in Duson, near Lafayette, he was childhood friends with Mark Guidry, who would go on to win more than 5,000 races. Clark now lives in the New Orleans area in St. Bernard, where he is a member of the local Hall of Fame.

“My dad trained a couple of Quarter Horses when I was a kid,” Clark said. “I grew up on a farm. We had cows, horses, pigs, the whole lot. I had quite a few riders right there in my vicinity – or guys that wanted to be riders – all around me from the start. E.J. Perrodin, who was one of my best friends, we used to go to the bush tracks together.”

The experiences at the bush tracks gave Clark the foundation he needed for a career that was “just meant to be, I think.”

“By the time you got to a recognized racetrack, you were pretty much polished and ready to go,” Clark said. “We don’t have those [bush tracks] anymore, and that’s a shame. Don’t get me wrong: There are good young riders in Louisiana. It’s just not like it was 30 years ago, when the numbers were huge. They were just coming out by the handfuls, but not anymore.”

Clark’s pending milestone will be a satisfying one for him on several levels but in particular because of the way it was achieved. He was a mainstay on the tough Chicago circuit for many years and also competed at top tracks in Florida, Kentucky, and New York.

“I’ve been riding for 40 years, and some people say, ‘You’ve only won 3,000 races?’ ” Clark said. “This is what they don’t get: You look at when I was in my prime, between 25 and 35, and look at all the riders I was riding with at their prime. I’m pretty proud of that fact. I was riding with Jerry Bailey, Pat Day, Craig Perret, Randy Romero, Mark Guidry, Shane Sellers, Earlie Fires, and the list goes on. Some of the best of the best.”

Clark’s first win came at Evangeline Downs in Carencro, La., in 1975, and it was at that track where he would later hit a milestone of 2,000 wins. Aside from the Kentucky Oaks, other career highlights include winning the Grade 1 Ashland with Lovely Maria and capturing the Pennsylvania Derby aboard Western Playboy. Clark also regularly worked Unbridled, who won the Kentucky Derby in 1990.

“When I was riding for Carl Nafzger, I worked Unbridled every time he worked, before the Derby and the Breeders’ Cup and all that,” Clark said.

Clark never rode Unbridled in a race, recalling that when Nafzger had asked if he was available for a turf race, Clark was already engaged to ride out of town that day. Other top horses Clark worked but never rode include the multiple Grade 1 winner I’m a Chatterbox.

Clark is now in the twilight of his career but said racing never gets old. It’s something he has enjoyed ever since he hit the track as a teenager.

“It’s like everybody says, if you love what you do, you don’t really work a day in your life,” Clark said. “I’m getting older now, and I’m going to let my body tell me when it’s time to walk away. But there’s no better feeling than winning a race. When I sit back and think about it, I ride racehorses for a living. How cool is that? That’s what keeps me going every day, to ride that next winner.”