Apprentice’s journey hits home

Apprentice jockey Drayden VanDyke, 19, earned the first win of his career as he guided Money Clip, a pick-up mount, to a last-to-first victory in Thursday’s (Nov. 21, 2013 sixth race at Betfair Hollywood Park in Inglewood.  VanDyke heads back to the jockeys room and he fellow riders "helped" him celebrate. ©Benoit Photo
Apprentice jockey Drayden VanDyke, 19, earned the first win of his career as he guided Money Clip, a pick-up mount, to a last-to-first victory in Thursday’s (Nov. 21, 2013 sixth race at Betfair Hollywood Park in Inglewood. VanDyke heads back to the jockeys room and he fellow riders "helped" him celebrate. ©Benoit Photo

HOT SPRINGS - He’s a little guy with big aspirations.

Apprentice jockey Drayden Van Dyke, 19, is so driven to polish his skills that he’s essentially working two jobs this winter.

Van Dyke, a Hot Springs native, normally rides at Santa Anita, but on dark days at the suburban Los Angeles track (Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday) he travels to Turf Paradise near Phoenix to further his equine education.

“It’s just to get as many wins as I can,” Van Dyke said. “I think if I can get the most wins out of apprentice riders, I can get the Eclipse Award for leading apprentice. That’s my goal.”

Van Dyke will have a chance to pad his resume for an Eclipse Award - horse racing’s equivalent of the Oscars - today at Oaklawn Park when he rides Please Explain for his mentor, trainer Tom Proctor, in the $150,000 Grade III Honeybee Stakes for 3-year-old fillies.

Van Dyke has won 21 races since he began riding professionally last fall, but the Honeybee will mark only the fourth stakes mount for the jockey, whose best finish to date was a second aboard Zimmer in the $75,000 Joe Hernandez on Feb. 23 at Santa Anita.

Van Dyke, who will ride throughout the year with an apprentice weight allowance, grew up about 6 miles west of Oaklawn before graduating from Lake Hamilton High School in 2012.

“More excited than nervous,” Van Dyke said of his homecoming. “You treat every race the same, like a $3,000 claiming race to a stakes race.You just try to keep your mind in one place.”

Van Dyke is the son of Seth Van Dyke, a former jockey who is now an exercise rider.

Drayden Van Dyke said he always wanted to follow in his father’s footsteps and began working as an exercise rider on weekends at Oaklawn for trainer James Baker while in high school.

“As long as I’ve known him, he’s always wanted to be a jockey,” said Van Dyke’s close friend, Samuel Kerr, a 2012 Lake Hamilton graduate who is a technician for totalisator service provider, AmTote, at Oaklawn. “The kid has so much desire. If I had half as much desire that he does, I would really be something. Nonstop every day, training.”

Kerr said he recalls VanDyke running several miles, before and after school, on a local trail to stay in shape, and mimic riding by straddling a saw horse parked on his front porch, make-shift equipment that he purchased for $40.

“He had his own stuff going on,” Kerr said. “Very dedicated.”

The 5-foot, 105-pound Van Dyke said he learned about three weeks ago that Please Explain was being pointed for the 1 1/16-mile Honeybee, but was told by Proctor to keep quiet about immediate plans for the daughter of Curlin.

Please Explain, who has never been ridden by Van Dyke, has won two consecutive races, including the $100,000 Suncoast Stakes on Feb. 1 at Tampa Bay Downs in Florida.

“Basically, it all depended on how the horse was doing leading up to this race,” Van Dyke said. “She’s doing good, so we’re coming here.”

Proctor gave Van Dyke his big break, hiring him at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Ky., about three weeks after the then-exercise rider graduated from Lake Hamilton.

“It’s not a good place to learn how to ride - on the racetrack,” Van Dyke said. “You go there once you’ve learned how to ride.”

Van Dyke worked for Proctor for about six weeks when the trainer suggested the would-be jockey go to Glen Hill Farm in Ocala, Fla., the 400-acre breeding and racing operation purchased roughly 50 years ago by Leonard Lavin, who founded Alberto-Culver, Co., the well-known producer of hair and beauty products.

Proctor’s family has had a long association with Glen Hill, a collaboration highlighted by One Dreamer’s upset victory in the 1994 Breeders’ Cup Distaff.

“He sent me to that farm to learn how to ride,” Van Dyke said.

Van Dyke spent about six months at Glen Hill, breaking the farm’s young horses. Since many were ticketed to eventually join Proctor in Southern California, the trainer asked Van Dyke to come, too.

Van Dyke said Proctor also believed it would benefit the young jockey to be around Hall of Fame riders like Gary Stevens and Mike Smith.

Fittingly, Van Dyke won his first career race for Proctor and Glen Hill when Money Clip produced a last-tofirst stretch move Nov. 21 at Hollywood Park in suburban Los Angeles.

Van Dyke lives two minutes from Santa Anita in an apartment he shares with Proctor.

“He’s really been a big help in my career,” Van Dyke said.

Drayden Van Dyke file PROFESSION Apprentice jockey AGE 19 BIRTHPLACE Louisville, Ky.

RESIDES Arcadia, Calif.

NOTEWORTHY Will ride at Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs for the first time, getting up on Please Explain in the $150,000 Grade III Honeybee Stakes for 3-year-old fillies. … Son of former jockey Seth Van Dyke. … Raised in Hot Springs and graduated from Lake Hamilton High School in 2012. … Worked for six months at Glen Hill Farm in Ocala, Fla., in 2012, breaking young horses. … Moved to Southern California to ride for trainer Tom Proctor and recorded his first career victory Nov. 21 at Hollywood Park in suburban Los Angeles. It was his second career mount. … Has 21 victories and $620,719 in purse earnings in his career. … Will ride with an apprentice weight allowance throughout 2014.

Sports, Pages 21 on 03/08/2014

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