4/20/05
By David Plotnek
TMSvideo.com

Twice a year Baseball lover’s debate if their respective heroes should be enshrined in the Hall of Fame, these ballots are scrutinized and second-guessed by fans and writers from Coast to Coast. Every major sports and almost every minor sport played in the United States have their respective Halls of Fame, Horse Racing is no exception. The Horse Racing Hall of Fame is located in Beautiful Saratoga Springs, New York and as one would expect has two distinct categories, Human and Animal. Voting is now underway to determine who will admitted to the Class of 2005, there are currently 84 Jockey s enshrined in the Hall of Fame, due to several rule changes it will be much harder to gain a place in the Hall from this class onwards.

After this long-winded introduction, I would like to state the case for a Jockey who is long overdue his place in Saratoga Springs, Ismael “Milo” Valenzuela. I would like to borrow a strategy from Baseball enthusiasts and let Statistics shine a light on his case. “Milo” won his first Kentucky Derby in 1958 on Tim Tam and since that Derby 46 others have been run, if you exclude the last 4 Derby’s (I consider them to current in determining eligibility) and focus on the 42 from 1959 until 2000, only 9 Jockeys who have ridden the winning Horse in arguably the most famous race in the World are not enshrined, one of the nine is “Milo”Valenzuela in 1968 on Forward Pass. During that period of time 8 Jockeys have won this fabled race exactly twice, 6 of them are in the Hall of Fame Ron Turcotte, Jacinto Vasquez, Eddie Delahoussaye, Chris McCarron, Jerry Bailey and Kent Desormeaux, the only exceptions are Chris Antley and “Milo”, each and every Jockey with more than two wins is enshrined. Of course, the Kentucky Derby is just one of many criteria used to evaluate a candidate’s resume. Of the 84 Jockeys, almost half that number either raced predominantly pre Second World War (these statistics are not helpful in the current evaluation process) or was Steeplechase riders. Ismael rose in 21,203 races and won 2,545 times, certainly not an overwhelming total, but a total similar to Hall of Famer’s Steve Cauthen, Manuel Ycaza and Sam Boulmetis, Sr., the later two never won the Kentucky Derby. Ivan Parke rode for only two years, Lavelle Ensor won 6,449 races, but no Triple Crown Winners, Manuel Ycaza won fewer races (2,367), all of these gentlemen are Hall of Famer’s, but Ismael “Milo” Valenzuela is not. He is also considered one of the forefathers and Trailblazers for the Hispanic and Latino Racing community; many as the “Jackie Robinson” of his time view him in his Sport, having to endure a tremendous amount of ethnic and language barriers and prejudices. His life has not been easy, the Drug Riddelin killed his wonderful wife on many years in a widely reported case, this was one of the landmark Riddelin cases that resulted in the ban of this drug, unfortunately, “Milo” is not in good health himself these days. I implore all voters and racing enthusiasts to take a much closer and longer look at this most deserving Candidate for the Hall of Fame, and Website has been created with a video tribute at http://milo.tmsvideo.com/career.html.