Stevens, Prat will ride at Keeneland

Jockeys Flavien Prat and Gary Stevens, who have combined to win 11 stakes at the Santa Anita winter-spring meeting, will ride the majority of April at Keeneland.

Stevens, who leads all jockeys with seven stakes wins at this meeting, said on Friday that he will ride at Santa Anita through the end of the meeting April 10 and be based in Kentucky through Kentucky Derby Day, May 7.

Stevens will miss the three-week spring meeting at Los Alamitos from April 14 to May 1. The Keeneland meeting runs April 8-29. Churchill Downs opens its spring-summer meeting April 30.

“I’m pretty sure I’ll go to Keeneland,” Stevens said. “With the Derby right around the corner, it makes sense. I don’t know how much I’ll be riding, but I don’t think I’d be riding much at Los Alamitos.”

Prat has won four stakes at this meeting and ranked third in the overall standings with 35 wins through Thursday. Rafael Bejarano led all riders with 49 wins through Thursday.

Prat will be based in Kentucky through the Kentucky Derby, according to his agent, Derek Lawson.

“We want to give it a shot,” he said.

Santiago Gonzalez, second in the standings through Thursday with 42 wins, will take a break in April to attend to immigration paperwork, according to his agent, Craig Stephen.

Gonzalez, a native of Venezuela, will “cherry pick” his mounts at Los Alamitos, Stephen said.