Davis, horses take advantage of warmup

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – There was a slight reprieve Wednesday morning from the brutal cold that has enveloped the New York area for more than a week. With temperatures in the low 20s and just a gentle breeze, horsemen were able to have a fairly normal training day.

Between Belmont Park and Aqueduct, 170 horses put in workouts Wednesday morning, the calm before a snowstorm scheduled to arrive late Wednesday and impact Thursday training. The snow is to be followed by the coldest temperatures of the winter on Friday and Saturday.

Jockey Dylan Davis said he worked 10 horses on Wednesday, including four trained by David Jacobson. Davis seemed legitimately disappointed that an 11th scheduled work, on a horse trained by Bill Mott, was canceled.

“It keeps a good mindset,” Davis, whose agent is Mike Migliore, said of his busy morning. “It shows that me and my agent are here, and we have business and it’s nothing to worry about with the cancellations because we know that when we do run we’re going to have some horses.”

Aqueduct canceled three full cards of racing last week and the last five races on another card after the jockeys refused to ride, citing several areas on the Aqueduct main track that were uneven. Though Davis won three of the four races run on that day’s card, he said he agreed with the decision to stop racing.

“My horses were handling it, but they were dropping into the holes there in the soft spots,” Davis said. “All the riders knew where they were. Just having to think about the spots on the track it didn’t help because we also have to think about our positioning and our race riding. We don’t want to think about where these spots are.”

There was a spot by the three-eighths pole on the Belmont Park training track Wednesday morning that needed to be addressed by the track maintenance crew during one of the renovation breaks.

With snow and wind expected Thursday and brutally cold temperatures forecast for Friday and Saturday, it is unlikely that Aqueduct will be able to conduct racing again until at least Sunday, and possibly not until Jan. 11. Whenever racing resumes, this circuit’s leading rider, Irad Ortiz Jr., will already be unpacked in south Florida, joining his brother Jose who began riding at Gulfstream Park on Dec. 30.

Davis said the absence of the Ortiz brothers and Rajiv Maragh, who moved to California, gives him, Kendrick Carmouche, Junior Alvarado, and other jockeys a chance to ride for leading trainers Rudy Rodriguez and Linda Rice.

Davis won 21 races (for 14 different trainers) during the Aqueduct fall meet, good enough for fifth in the standings. His average win mutuel was $19.20. His three-win Saturday was the first time he rode that many winners on one card at a New York Racing Association track. As an apprentice in 2013, he rode five winners on a card at Indiana Grand.