Horse racing notes: Juan Hernandez, Bob Baffert are Southern California’s big winners
Santa Anita, Del Mar and Los Alamitos crown leading jockeys and trainers at their individual meets but award no overall titles for the best of the Southern California daytime thoroughbred circuit.
By unofficial count, though, Juan Hernandez was the top jockey with 176 winning rides (and about $12 million in purses), 41 more than Antonio Fresu, in the year that began Dec. 26, 2024, at Santa Anita and ended Dec. 14, 2025, at Los Al.
Bob Baffert was the top trainer with 91 victories (and about $10.2 million in purses), 13 more than Phil D’Amato. Lists of leaders for the past year are elsewhere on this page.
• In Los Al quarter-horse racing, Henry Reynoso Lopez earned his first riding title with 44 wins for the year, five ahead of five-time champion Cruz Mendez, while Scott Willoughby led trainers for the second time in with 42 wins, seven more than Jose Flores. The track in Orange County opens its new season Sunday with an eight-race quarter-horse and thoroughbred card starting at 5 p.m. after canceling Saturday’s card because of the rain forecast.
• Starting with its rain-delayed opening day Sunday (11 a.m. first post), Santa Anita will race seven out of eight days, taking only Tuesday off, and hold 12 graded or listed stakes in that span. The Grade II Joe Hernandez Stakes on Monday pits talent vs. course know-how, with Breeders’ Cup Sprint runner-up Imagination (Juan Hernandez riding) making his first try on turf and facing hillside winners like 2024 Joe Hernandez champion Motorious (Fresu), Yellow Card (Kazushi Kimura) and El Potente (Hector Berrios).
• Rudy Campas, the popular former jockey known for his success at the L.A. County Fair races in Pomona, died at age 85 on Dec. 17. Campas recorded about 1,289 wins from 1958 to 1987, the Daily Racing Form reported, and finished 16th aboard Rancho Lejos in his lone Kentucky Derby, the 1970 race won by Dust Commander. Campas was credited with mentoring teen apprentice jockey Aaron Gryder in the 1980s. A Riverside-area resident, he was a fixture in Del Mar’s Rocking Chair Derby exhibition races for retired riders in the 1990s.
• The maiden 3-year-old colt Chosen Son died in an accident on the Santa Anita training track Monday morning. The horse was reported to have unseated his rider and run loose before twice hitting the outside rail; the rider was uninjured. Based on California Horse Racing Board equine fatalities data, Chosen Son is the 36th racehorse to die in racing and training, from musculoskeletal injuries and other causes, at Santa Anita, Los Alamitos and Del Mar since the start of the California season Dec. 26, 2024. That total is right in line with the past two years, when 36 and 37 horses had died through Dec. 21.
SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA LEADERS
(Totals for Santa Anita, Del Mar and Los Alamitos thoroughbred meets Dec. 26, 2024-Dec. 14, 2025)
Jockeys / Wins
Juan Hernandez / 176
Antonio Fresu / 135
Umberto Rispoli / 123
Hector Berrios / 113
Armando Ayuso / 100
Kazushi Kimura / 89
Kyle Frey / 71
Flavien Prat / 57
Tiago Pereira / 56
Kyle Baze / 47
Edwin Maldonado / 46
Diego Herrera / 46
Trainers / Wins
Bob Baffert / 91
Phil D’Amato / 78
Mark Glatt / 72
Doug O’Neill / 70
John Sadler / 69
Michael McCarthy / 61
Steve Knapp / 60
Jeff Mullins / 56
George Papaprodromou / 49
Peter Miller / 44
Richard Baltas / 37
Bob Hess 36
UPCOMING STAKES
SANTA ANITA
Sunday
• $300,000, Grade I Malibu Stakes, 3-year-olds, 7 furlongs
• $300,000, Grade I La Brea Stakes, 3-year-old fillies, 7 furlongs
• $300,000, Grade I American Oaks, 3-year-old fillies, 1¼ miles on turf
• $200,000, Grade II Laffit Pincay Jr. Stakes, 3-year-olds and up, 1 1/16 miles
• $200,000, Grade II Mathis Mile Stakes, 3-year-olds, 1 mile on turf
• $100,000, Grade III San Gabriel Stakes, 3-year-olds and up, 1⅛ miles on turf
Monday
• $200,000, Grade II Joe Hernandez Stakes, 3-year-olds and up, about 6½ furlongs on turf
• $100,000 Blue Norther Stakes, 2-year-old fillies, 1 mile on turf
Wednesday
• $100,000, Grade III Robert J. Frankel Stakes, fillies and mares, 3 and up, 1⅛ miles on turf
• $100,000 Eddie Logan Stakes, 2-year-olds, 7 furlongs
LOS ALAMITOS
Sunday
• $25,000 Holiday Handicap, 2-year-olds, 350 yards