Junior Alvarado Joins TDN Writers’ Room Podcast, Presented by Keeneland

[Wandering Eyes]

It's been a magical year so far for jockey Junior Alvarado, who rode Sovereignty (Into Mischief) to victories in the GI Kentucky Derby and the GI Belmont S. They were the first wins in the Triple Crown series for the 39-year-old native of Venezuela, but they surely won't be the last. Alvarado now rides regularly for Hall of Fame trainer Bill Mott, whose stable is loaded with talent.

But Alvarado almost missed the Derby assignment. He fractured his shoulder blade in a Mar. 23 spill at Gulfstream. He would definitely miss the GI Florida Derby and doctors warned him he might not be ready to ride in the Derby. Alvarado would hear nothing of that and worked overtime to be ready for the first leg of the Triple Crown.

What was it like to think you might have the best 3-year-old in the country but wouldn't be able to ride him in the Derby? That was one of many questions our team asked Alvarado on this week's Thoroughbred Daily News Writers' Room Podcast presented by Keeneland. Alvarado was the Gainesway Guest of the Week.

“I remember laying in the bed right there with my agent next to me,” Alvarado said. “I kept telling my agent, 'I think I may have a fracture. I can handle pain. I've been through a lot of injuries and I knew that this one was worse than normal. Then the doctor told us I had a fractured scapula. I asked if I could come back in a week a they said, no, no, no. You have a completely fractured scapula. You will have to probably be out between six to eight weeks. So like right there, just, I remember looking at my agent and I'm like shaking my hand. I thought 'why does this have to happen to me?' Like why these things keep happening to me?  Like, God, why? Like, why?”

He went to see a doctor who had treated him before in Saratoga for a second opinion and got a much different diagnosis. This doctor said that if he followed his instructions he would be back well before the Derby. It worked as Alvarado returned on Apr. 16, just 23 days after the accident.

The combination of Bill Mott and Alvarado has worked out nicely for both individuals.

“When I moved to New York, I had Mike Sellitto as my agent,” Alvarado said. “He's a very good, close friend to Bill Mott. That's how we started it. I will say probably six, seven, eight years ago now, I used to ride all those nice horses in the morning. Then, the mount in the afternoon would go to guys like Mike Smith or Joel Rosario. I remember my agent telling me, just keep working, keep working. You're going to have your time and when you have your time, then you'll take. By working a lot of his horses in the morning,  I came to understand what Bill really likes to do with his horses, with the babies, how he develops the horses. Every trainer has a different mentality and different way to approach their training method. I just fit pretty well with what Bill was doing and I like the way he does it. I started getting more chances and more opportunities from him. I was able to perform well in the afternoon and that's how more opportunities kept coming my way.”

Alvarado has won 421 races for Mott, 65 graded stakes and $51.5 million in purse money.

Sovereignty isn't the first good horse Alvarado has ridden for Mott. No one will ever forget the story of Cody's Wish (Curlin) and Cody Dorman. Alvarado said he was never more nervous than when he was aboard Cody's Wish.

“That was very special, he said. “It was completely different than riding Sovereignty. With Sovereignty I was always calm. Riding  Cody's Wish, I felt lot of pressure every single time I was riding him. I didn't want to be the one who made a mistake and be the villain of the beautiful story of that was happening. That was always in my mind, like I cannot make mistakes, I can't do anything wrong, can't overdo it. I can't do anything to get that horse beat because all the eyes are on me and I'm going to look like the bad guy if he got beat. But every time we won I felt so much happiness.”

In our “Fastest Horse of the Week,” segment, which is sponsored by WinStar, we went over the many reasons there are breed to the WinStar stallion Cogburn. The fastest horse of the week was Ways and Means (Practical Joke), who got a 111 Beyer for winning the GII Bed o'Roses S. The 111 was the highest Beyer number assigned to any horse this year.

Elsewhere on the podcast, which is also sponsored by the KTOB, the Pennsylvania Horse Breeders' Association, West Point Thoroughbreds, 1/ST Racing and 1/ST TV, the team of Randy Moss, Zoe Cadman and Bill Finley went over not just the Belmont but all the Grade I stakes action over the weekend at Saratoga. The question was asked, “Would Sovereignty have swept the Triple Crown if he had run in the Preakness?” The consensus was yes.

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