Kentucky Derby 2021: It took 3,400 wins, but Carmouche finally gets his chance
It began last November when few people were watching. With the focus of the racing world at that time on the Breeders’ Cup at Keeneland, Kendrick Carmouche went on a hot streak, winning nine races over three days at Aqueduct.
Sure, he took advantage of the absence of the big-name riders such as Irad Ortiz Jr, Jose Ortiz, Luis Saez, and Joel Rosario. But when those guys returned, Carmouche did not stop winning. He capped a terrific Aqueduct fall meet by winning the Cigar Mile, his first career Grade 1 victory. He won the meet riding title.
Seven months later, Carmouche will be at Churchill Downs to ride in his first Kentucky Derby. Everyone will be watching.
Carmouche rides Bourbonic, whom he guided to a 72-1 upset in the Grade 2 Wood Memorial at Aqueduct on April 3. Bourbonic will likely be somewhere just short of that price on Saturday in the 20-horse Derby field. That doesn’t faze Carmouche, who also gets to ride his first Kentucky Oaks on Friday aboard longshot Maracuja.
“I got two legitimate shots to win these races,” Carmouche said. “They do have other favorites in the race, but I’m a favorite. I’m going into it like that.”
Carmouche, 37, approaches every race like that. One would be hard-pressed to find a more upbeat, confident person in the jockeys’ room – any jockeys’ room. It hardly seems contrived.
“I just feel like being positive for myself and my horse is the most positive thing you can do going out on the racetrack,” Carmouche said. “I accept losing more than winning in this game. If you can come to accept that you can always be happy and always be positive.”
Carmouche, the son of jockey Sylvester Carmouche, has done his share of winning. He has won more than 3,400 races since riding his first winner in 2000 at Evangeline Downs. He developed into the dominant rider at Parx Racing, winning seven riding titles in the early 2010s before moving his tack to New York in July 2015.
“I knew if I got a shot I could prove myself like I did in Philadelphia Park and that’s what I’ve done over the last five years,” Carmouche said. “Keep grinding it out, grinding it out and the opportunity came in the fall and I was ready.”
Carmouche rode several winners for trainer Todd Pletcher during those three days last November at Aqueduct. He was aboard Pletcher’s 5,000th career winner. Coincidentally, Carmouche was aboard for a maiden win by Known Agenda, who is running in the Derby, and won the Tempted Stakes on Malathaat, the potential favorite in Friday’s Oaks. Pletcher is the trainer of Bourbonic.
“He’s a very accomplished rider, but over the past seven, eight months he’s taken his game to a new level,” Pletcher said. “By having a successful run like he did at Aqueduct in the fall it increased his opportunities and given him the chance to ride better horses and he’s delivered in those cases.”
In the fall of 2018, Carmouche seemed poised to take the next step in his career before he suffered a broken leg in a spill at Kentucky Downs on Sept. 8. Carmouche was out five months.
Rather than sulk at the loss of business, Carmouche basked in the joy of being able to spend time with his wife, Whitney, an equestrian coach at the University of Delaware, and the couple’s two children, Olivia and Kendrick Jr.
“It brought me closer to my wife and my kids and made me enjoy them and love them even more,” said Carmouche, who still lives in Delaware and spends three nights a week at a Long Island hotel.
One of the story lines leading into Saturday is that Carmouche will become the first African-American jockey to ride the Kentucky Derby since Kevin Krigger in 2013. Carmouche does not get too caught up in that part of it. He would prefer to just be example of the product of a strong work ethic, instilled in him by his parents.
“If you work hard, this is what you get at the end,” he said. “I hope this opens up a lot of eyes, black, white whatever, whoever’s looking at me and listening to me talk about these horses and me riding and the passion that they have. I hope it drives them in whatever career they have to be just as successful.”
Carmouche is expecting to have plenty of support at the Derby. In addition to his immediate family, he’ll have several nieces, nephews, cousins, and friends from both the Delaware Valley and in Louisville at the track.
“I told them they have to show up, it’s going to be history,” Carmouche said.