John Velazquez will ride his Kentucky Derby winner Animal Kingdom when the
recent Dubai World Cup hero makes his career finale at the mid-June Royal Ascot
meeting in England.
“Johnny knows the horse better than any other rider and he has had success at
Royal Ascot,” trainer Graham Motion said. “He won on a straightaway at Royal
Ascot and if we decide to go in the Queen Anne Stakes on opening day up the
straight, that experience figures to come in handy.”
Velazquez rode at Royal Ascot in 2000, 2009 and 2011. He has not been aboard
Animal Kingdom since an allowance win at Gulfstream Park in February 2012. Joel
Rosario guided Animal Kingdom to his dominating triumph in the Dubai World Cup.
“No American jockey is riding better than Joel right now,” Barry Irwin of
Team Valor said. “We thought he gave a peerless performance in the World Cup.
But we don’t think it would be fair for the jockey to ride him on a straightaway
when neither jockey nor horse had done it before.
“Dropping from a mile and a quarter around turns on a synthetic track to
running uphill on a straight course on grass is quite a transition for any
horse, especially at this level. So the decision to go with a jockey that knows
the horse and the course made the job easier. It was a difficult decision.”
Key to naming Velasquez was the rider’s willingness to fly to England in
order to breeze Animal Kingdom prior to the Royal meeting.
Motion has nominated Animal Kingdom to both the opening-day Group 1 Queen
Anne Stakes over a mile and the second-day Group 1 Prince of Wales’s Stakes over
a mile and a quarter, keeping his options open as the horse steps up his
preparations.
Animal Kingdom has raced 11 times for 5 wins and 5 seconds. His lone
non-productive race came as the favorite to win the Belmont Stakes in
2011, when a chain-reaction bumping incident almost caused both rider and horse
to fall to the ground.
With earnings of $8,399,384, the Leroidesanimaux horse ranks behind only
three other American-based horses in career earnings on the all-time list.
Animal Kingdom will enter stud at Arrowfield in Australia in September.
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