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Barn Notes: Thursday, May 06, 2010
In Today’s Notes:
· Jockey Inez Karlsson:
· Music and Mothers Take Center Stage at
JOCKEY INEZ KARLSSON:
For the first time in the history of
Following a riding double last Sunday, jockey Inez Karlsson forged to the front of the
It’s been an amazing climb for Karlsson during her relatively brief career which began at
Later that fall, she was leading rider at Hawthorne for its fall session, repeated that championship at the Southside course in the spring of 2010, became Arlington’s all-time leading female rider in June last summer and moved up a spot to fourth in 2009’s final standings.
“Last season here it took me 45 mounts before I won my first race,” Karlsson said Thursday morning in the jockeys’ room. “This season I broke my maiden on the first day so things are starting off well for me.
“I think a lot of people have a shot to be leading rider this year, because no one guy has all the business,” Karlsson said. “For instance, last year I rode mostly for Frank Kirby, but now I ride for anyone. My business looks very positive, but I still have a long ways to go to be the best I can be. I set different goals to spur me on every year. Now, I’m telling myself I have to get stronger, and I have to ride smarter. Last week I got beat three heads, so the way I think, I could have had eight winners. I’ve got to improve on that. I’m very hard on myself, and sometimes when I lose I can accept the fact that it was due to circumstances beyond my control and that I was just unlucky, but sometimes I think that if I’d done something different at some point in a race I could have won that race.
“I went to
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Barn Notes
May 6, 2010
Page 2
“Also, I rode one horse at Gulfstream last winter in the Sunshine Millions, but the horse didn’t do any good,” Karlsson said. “I usually haven’t had much success when I’ve gone out of town to ride a race, but I did go out of town to ride a horse at Keeneland this spring, and when I won that race against all of those top riders there it made me feel very good.
“Where would I like to be in my career five or 10 years from now?” Karlsson asked rhetorically. “That’s hard to say. I can’t really answer that right now because as you get older things are always changing. I’m 27 right now, and being female – I might want to settle down fairly soon and take time to have a family. Being a female athlete, if I’m pregnant, I have to interrupt my career to have a baby, and if I do that, would I want to come back to ride again – and would I be as good as when I stopped? Or would I even want to come back – or would I want to stay home and take care of the baby and try to have other children? Male jockeys don’t have that problem to consider – they just keep riding, but for a female it’s a different situation.
“These are all things I have to consider in the next five years or so,” Karlsson concluded, “so I’ll just have to think about all those kinds of things as my life moves along.”
MUSIC AND MOTHERS TAKE CENTER STAGE AT
Mother’s Day at
Also, in another
However, this Saturday Arlington will offer another attraction for the first time in its history when the race course celebrates the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s Day at the Races.
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Sincerely,
Dave Zenner
Senior Manager of Communications
847-385-7535
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