Brush tracks to the big leagues

Calvin Borel’s recent retirement is another reminder why before too long they’re going to have to add a special Cajun Country wing to the Jockey’s Hall of Fame.
Borel, who hails from the St. Martin Parish community of Catahoula, guaranteed his place in the Hall when he won the Kentucky Derby three times in four years – aboard Street Sense (2007), Mine That Bird (2009) and Super Saver (2010). Nobody’d done that before and nobody’s done it since.
But he was a Hall of Fame rider even without that marvelous streak. Those three Derby wins were just a part of his 1,189 triumphs at Churchill Downs over more than two decades. That’s second only to Louisville legend Pat Day, who retired in 2005 with 2,482.
Overall, Borel won 5,146 races aboard mounts that earned more than $127 million in purses. His 60 stakes victories are third behind Day (156) and Lafayette native Robby Albarado (76), who is still riding with more than 4,600 wins under his belt.
Those numbers put Borel right up there with such legends as New Iberian Eddie Delahoussaye, who retired with 6,383 wins; Maurice native Kent Desormeaux, who holds the U.S. record for most races won in a single year (598 wins in 1989) and who had 5,141 wins overall; Carencro’s Ron Ardoin, who won 5,226 times, mostly on Louisiana tracks; Erath’s Randy Romero, who, despite health problems that would have felled lesser men, came in first 4,294 times and was the leading rider at 10 tracks on 21 separate occasions; Shane Sellers, another Erath native who has 4,393 career wins; and Sunset’s Ray Sibille, who rode 4,263 winning mounts.
Some people would add Craig Perret and his 4,415 wins to the list, but he had the misfortune of being born in New Orleans, a town still undecided on whether it wants to be a part of Cajun Country. Joe Talamo, who’s made a name for himself riding mostly in southern California, had the good sense to be born in Marrero which is not quite Cajun Country but at least is on the west bank of the Mississippi.
In 2007, when some of the greats gathered in Opelousas for a race billed as the Cajun Jockey Challenge, somebody figured out that all of the wins of jockeys reared just within 30 miles of Lafayette added together would come to “67,000 and counting.” That’s pretty impressive.
Day, who was Borel’s chief protagonist at Churchill Downs, took note of that, telling an interviewer, “I don’t know of any other sport, in any country in the world, where you would see this level of success from such a relatively small area.”
The reasons for that go way back, Ed McNamara, who wrote a history of Cajun racing, puts it succinctly in a quote from UL professor Mathe Allain: “Most of the people are profoundly fond of contests. … But since the beginning, horse racing has been the most interesting activity to the Cajun and his family.”
A lot of these jockeys – and a lot of others who eventually outgrew the saddle – rode their first race as children on the bush tracks that dotted south Louisiana. There are stories of kids as young as five hanging on for dear life as quarterhorses dashed down a straight track. The younger they were, the lighter they were. Calvin Borel rode his first match race as an 8-year-old at Louis Huval’s track near Youngsville. Kent Desormeaux thinks he was 6 or 7 when he rode his first winner.
Those bush tracks offered serious competition – not to mention barbecue, beer, and a good time. But a new world opened for Cajun Country jockeys on April 28,1966, when the first races were run at the original Evangeline Downs in Carencro, and expanded for them on Sept. 20, 1973, when Delta Downs opened at Vinton.
These tracks offered opportunities close to home for jockeys to ride thoroughbreds in regular competition, get noticed by the Racing Form and trainers and owners everywhere, and to move on to bigger tracks.

You can contact Jim Bradshaw at jimbradshaw4321@gmail.com or P.O. Box 1121, Washington LA 70589.