Jockey Hill gets 1,000th career win

Jockey Channing Hill won his 1,000th career race last Friday at Churchill Downs, piloting the 5-year-old mare Shut the Gate to win a claiming race for trainer Chris Hartman.

Through Sunday, Hill had won 1,001 races from 9,308 starts, with 1,046 seconds and 1,160 thirds, for $40.5 million in mount earnings. He has won 16 graded stakes since 2003, with the most recent coming aboard Pleuven in the Grade 2 Wise Dan Stakes on June 18 at Churchill Downs. His lone Grade 1 victory came aboard First Defence in the 2008 Forego Stakes at Saratoga.

“When you’re younger, you don’t realize how much a thousand really is and all the work that has to go into it,” Hill said. “Obviously, I’m really thankful for the people that helped me along the way. That is probably the most special part about it. Obviously, I couldn’t be here without the people who have been giving me the opportunity and the horses themselves who have taken me there.”

Hill will be part of a deep jockey colony at the Ellis Park meet that opens this weekend.

“I would really like to stay consistent, within the top 25 [in the rider standings] throughout my career,” Hill said of his goals. “That, to me, would be the best because then you get some consistency and people rely on you.”

• Heading into the final three days of the Churchill Downs spring/summer meet, Mark Casse and Mike Maker are still deadlocked atop the trainer standings with 18 wins each.

Maker is seeking his sixth Churchill training title, while Casse is looking for his first since 1988.

Corey Lanerie appears to have sewn up his 11th Churchill jockey title, with 51 wins to 38 for Julien Leparoux.

Prominent owners and breeders Ken and Sarah Ramsey have 12 wins at the meet to seven for John Oxley and have virtually locked up their record-extending 26th owners’ title.