Jockey Chris DeCarlo reached
an important milestone at Monmouth Park on Saturday when he won his 1,000th
career race.
DeCarlo booted home Oconee
Gold ($5.00) in the eighth race for trainer Ramon Moya and accepted
congratulations in a winner’s circle celebration afterward. He scored his 999th
victory just one race earlier on Dontwait Toolong ($18.20) for trainer Jane
Cibelli.
“It’s exciting,” said DeCarlo,
44, who began riding at 16 and has been a member of the jockey colony at tracks
all over the East Coast and around the world. “I just want to continue to win
races and I know that if I do that, I’ll keep being successful and keep getting
to do what I love.”
DeCarlo won the 1986 Haskell
Invitational on Wise Times when he was only 17 and led all riders in stakes
wins at Monmouth in 2005. The following year he piloted Park Avenue Ball to
three stakes wins, including Monmouth’s Iselin.
Recently, he spent the 2010-2011winter in Saudi Arabia riding first call for
King Aziz.