“Shane! Come
back!” For movie buffs, it became one of the most famous exit lines in
cinematic history, uttered by child actor Brandon De Wilde as the wounded
gunslinger Shane, played by Alan Ladd, rode off into the mountains in the 1953
classic Western. Will Shane recover, or will he die? That’s left
for the audience to determine after the theater lights go up.
Jockey Shane Sellers, who set
a single season record of 219 wins during a meeting at Arlington that still stands, left Chicago as
a rising star who kept ascending for a number of years after that before
hitting a slippery slope. Some mistakes that followed eventually led to
Sellers’ retirement from the saddle for four and a half years. However,
that retirement ended last year.
Shane lives! He has come
back – first at Louisiana Downs, and then at Fair Grounds for a successful
winter in New Orleans.
This spring and summer he has continued his success at Delaware
Park, and now he’s coming back to Arlington for the rest of
the summer.
“I’m looking forward to coming
back to the place where I had such success,” said Sellers over the phone
Thursday morning while speaking from Delaware.
“I’m very grateful for the opportunities I’ve been given since I came out of
retirement, and also for this opportunity to get with Pat Cuccurullo as my
agent and come back to Chicago.
He’s been a trainer at Arlington
in recent years and we have a lot of the same old acquaintances from the old
days.
“This really feels like a good
fit for me right now,” said Sellers of his impending return. “It feels
good and I’m very excited. I feel like a bug boy again.
“I have a long way to go,”
said Sellers, “and I have a lot of amends to make, but I’m making
progress. When I first got to Delaware,
I went by the barn of Larry and Cindy Jones to say hello, and basically they
let me know I could say hello but they weren’t going to use me on any of their
horses.
“Then, Larry and Cindy and I
kept running into each other after Bible classes at Delaware and eventually we got to
talking. Then one day, I looked on the overnight and they had
put me on one of their horses.
“One thing that made me feel
real good was something that Larry said to me the other day,” Sellers
said. “He said, ‘I like the Shane Sellers I’m seeing today.’
“I like the ‘me’ I’m seeing
today, too,” concluded Sellers. “When Larry says something to me like
that, and (trainer) Frank (Bobby) Springer said something very much like that,
it makes me feel like I’m doing something right. If I can continue in
that pattern, and combine that with all the abilities I have as a rider, I see
no reason I can’t get back to where I once was.”
THREE NEW BLOGS BEGUN AT ARLINGTON PARK
Now available for viewing on
the Arlington Park website at arlingtonparklive.com
are three new blogs.
Alyssa Ali, Arlington’s entertainment reporter, promises,
“I’ve got your scoop from the Park from fashion and celebrity sightings to food
and cocktails.”
Brian Spencer, of Arlington’s
handicapping department, says the late return of his blog is actually pretty
good, because, “We’re out of the mayhem of the Triple Crown season, we just
passed Prairie State Festival Day, and that always reminds me that it’s mere
weeks until Million Preview Day (July 17) and then we approach the International
Festival of Racing on Arlington Million Day (Aug. 21).”
The Inez Karlsson blog will
allow fans a one-of-a-kind chance to go up close and personal with one of Arlington’s most popular
jockeys. She was Arlington’s leading
apprentice in 2008 and was fifth in the current standings entering Thursday’s Arlington program.
JESSICA NAMED TO 2010’S ‘40 UNDER 40’ CLUB
Jessica Pacheco, racing
analyst at Arlington Park and Fair Grounds Race Course, has been named as one
of Thoroughbred racing’s “40 Under 40” club – profiling young people with
careers worthy of watching in the Sport of Kings.
“The thing I like best about
this is that shows that there are a lot of people under 40 in this industry,”
Pacheco said. “Sometimes people erroneously believe that there are no
young people that are pursuing careers in this business.”