DMTC News – From the Wire

Stable Notes July 18, 2026
Jim Charvat —-

THRILLS AND BIG PAYOFFS MARK OPENING DAY AT DEL MAR

Another Opening Day at Del Mar is in the books and judging by the chatter on social media and the smiles on the faces of Del Mar officials, it was another huge success. A lively crowd of 21,422 packed the grandstand for 10 races which provided no shortage of excitement.

It started with Mighty Kai winning the first race, a one mile claiming race that started right in front of the large crowd. The day finished with Goodies crossing the line first as the sunset off in the Pacific giving trainer Philip D’Amato his first victory of the meet and jockey Hector I. Berrios his second win on the afternoon.

In between there was the summer’s first longshot victory. Strident Miss got up at the wire and won the head bob to take Race 5 at 40-1. The 2-year-old daughter of Pavel paid $82 to win and spoiled most all of the Pick 6 tickets in the very first leg. Hence a carryover Saturday of $80,363.10. Seven of the 10 races paid $10 or more to win.

Trainer Michael McCarthy won three of the first six races, going back-to-back in the second and third races with Victorious Dream and Lost Angeles. He made his third trip to the winner’s circle in Race 6 with Detain.

“Things kind of fell into place,” McCarthy notes. “We got some pretty good rides and the horses were ready to run.”

The traditional Opening Day feature, the $150,000 Oceanside, did not disappoint as Proletariat ran out to a big lead and never stopped, tying the 22-year-old stakes record of 1:33.54 for the one mile on the turf.

The Oceanside is the local prep for the G2 Del Mar Derby but trainer Jeff Mullins wasn’t quite ready to declare Proletariat for the big race on August 23.

“I don’t know, we always thought he was a sprinter,” Mullins stated afterward. “Maybe he’s got a new dimension now.”

Total handle for the day was $21,021,373. On track was $3,011,802.

And we’d be remiss if we didn’t mention Chun-Mae Hauschka of Laguna Niguel, winner of the 32nd annual Opening Day Hats Contest at Del Mar.

Racing resumes Saturday with a pair of Graded stakes races on the 11-race card. First post time is 2 p.m.

TRIO OF OUT-OF-TOWN JOCKEYS SHIP IN FOR G2 SAN CLEMENTE

Three talented jockeys who don’t regularly ride at Del Mar are in town Saturday to ride in the G2 San Clemente.

Ben Curtis will ride the morning line favorite, Raiding Party, for trainer Brendan Walsh. Curtis is an accomplished British rider who came to the U.S. in 2023. He rides the Midwest / Kentucky circuit and has the distinction of being Magnitude’s jockey in four of his races last year including the colt’s victory in the G2 Risen Star.

Adam Beschizza is another Midwest / Kentucky -based jockey. He’ll ride Ground Support for trainer Kelsey Danner. He’s ridden the filly in all four of her career starts including the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf at Del Mar last fall when they finished a game third. His career started in Britain before he relocated to the U.S. in 2017.

Rasheed Hughes is a Florida-based jockey who will ship-in and ride trainer Saffie Joseph’s Spirit Doll. He picked up the ride on the daughter of Tiz the Law last out and won the $75,000 Honey Ryder at Gulfstream Park. Hughes is from Barbados where he became a champion rider before branching out to Canada and the U.S. in recent years.

The G2 San Clemente is Race 9. Probable post time is 6 p.m.

STAKES WINNERS CLASH SUNDAY IN $100,000 WICKERR STAKES

The final stakes race of opening weekend is a contentious affair that pits older horses in a one-mile test on the Jimmy Durante Turf Course. The race often serves as a prep for either the G2 Del Mar Mile or the G2 Del Mar Handicap later in the meet. Several contenders in the Wickerr are past stakes winners at Del Mar. Seven of the nine entries have won a stakes race during their career.

Trainer Mark Glatt brings a trio of horses to the dance including one of the favorites in Freedom’s Not Free. The son of Omaha Beach is coming off a nose victory in the G3 Daytona on Santa Anita’s hillside turf course last month, his first outing since running second to The Padre in last year’s G2 Del Mar Derby.

“He ran excellent off the comeback,” Glatt recalls. “I wasn’t sure he could win going six and a half down the hill and he needed every inch of it but he got there. It’s always good to see a horse come back off of a layoff and perform well because you never know for sure.”

Glatt says the 10-month layoff was by design.

“He had had a pretty good campaign up to that point,” Glatt notes,” and it just felt like he needed a good rest so he got it.”

Glatt also sends out Mi Hermano Ramon, winner of the 2024 G2 Seabiscuit at Del Mar. He has raced eight times since that fall day and has yet to get back to the winner’s circle, though he came close in last year’s G1 Shoemaker Mile, missing by a neck. He returned and ran in this year’s Shoemaker finishing sixth but Glatt liked the effort.

“I thought he ran very well last time,” Glatt says. “He only got beat 2 ½ lengths and showed quite a bit of run in the race so I think he’ll move forward off of that.”

Glatt’s third entry in the race is First Peace, the 2024 winner of the Wickerr. He also returned from an extended layoff in the Daytona and finished third, 1 ½ lengths behind his stablemate.

“He didn’t have the cleanest of trips or I think he would have been closer to the two in front of him,” Glatt states. “He’s won this race in the past so he’s certainly quite capable of going the one mile.”

King of Gosford is dropping out of graded stakes company into the Wickerr. In his last outing he finished third in the G1 Shoemaker, just 1 ½ lengths behind the winner Formidable Man.

“I thought he ran a valiant race last time in a grade one,” trainer Phil D’Amato says. “It was his third off the bench and I think he’s steadily rounding into form and it looks to be a good spot for him.”

One of the more intriguing entries in the race is Atitlan, a horse that hasn’t run since finishing third in a three-way blanket finish in the G2 Del Mar Handicap last summer. He was in the barn of trainer John Shirreffs who passed away in February and is now with Richard Mandella.

“He had been turned out for a minor injury,” Mandella claims. “It was time for him to come back into training about the time that John passed. A mile might be a little short for him but he’s training really well. I expect he’ll run well but he’ll be better when he runs longer, like in the Del Mar Handicap.”

The $100,000 Wickerr will be Race 9 on the 11-race Sunday program. Probable post time is 6 p.m.

Here’s the field from the inside post with the jockeys and morning line odds: Freedom’s Not Free (Antonio Fresu, 5-1); Atitlan (Hector I Berrios, 6-1); Twirling Point (Ricky Gonzalez, 12-1); Artislas (Juan Hernandez, 12-1); King of Gosford (Umberto Rispoli, 5/2); Mi Hermano Ramon (Joel Rosario, 5-1); Captain Choochies (Edwin Maldonado, 12-1); First Peace (Mike Smith, 4-1) and American Hope (Armando Ayuso, 12-1).

HERNANDEZ BACK TO DEFEND HIS RIDING TITLE AGAIN IN 2026

Jockey Juan Hernandez has spent a lot of time atop the jockey standings at Del Mar. He’s won the summer meet four years running and until Umberto Rispoli wrestled away last fall’s Bing Crosby title Hernandez had won five riding titles in a row dating back to the summer of 2023. Since 2021 he has won seven of the 10 riding titles at the seaside oval and if it weren’t for Flavien Prat there might have been more.

The seven titles put him in a tie for the most by a jockey at Del Mar along with Bill Shoemaker, Rafael Bejarano and Prat. Of course, in the case of Shoemaker, there was no fall meet to win back in his day.

Hernandez has achieved some major milestones in his career since the last time we saw him ride at Del Mar. He rode in his first Kentucky Derby this spring, notched his 3,000th career win and even made the trip over to Royal Ascot. Another first for the 34-year-old rider.

It was not Hernandez first time at Churchill Downs on Derby Day this year but it was the first time he had a mount in the Run For the Roses. He rode Potente, a colt out of the Bob Baffert barn. The 12th-place finish in the Derby certainly didn’t detract from the experience for Hernandez.

“That was amazing,” Hernandez says. “It’s a crazy weekend over there but I had a really nice time. As a jockey you always dream to ride in a Kentucky Derby and I think my horse ran pretty good.”

Running against 17 other horses was a new experience for Hernandez.

“You have to come out of the gate and get position and then keep your position,” Hernandez notes. “Then you have to try to save some horse for the end of the race, because the mile and a quarter is a long race. It’s not easy but I think I rode my horse good and hope to try again next year.”

Of course nothing compares to riding in the Kentucky Derby, but the highlight to his weekend came the day before when he ran second in the Kentucky Oaks with Meaning. He got run down by the winner Always a Runner in the final strides.

“Turning for home I hit the lead at the quarter pole and I thought I got it,” Hernandez recalls. “But that other filly beat me. Still, that was another really good experience.”

The 3,000-win milestone came a couple of weeks after the Derby. He rode Syntax to victory in a starter-allowance race at Santa Anita on May 24.

“It was a really good feeling,” Hernandez remembers. “I worked hard to win all of those races and hitting 3,000 races was an amazing feeling. I’m really grateful for the owners and all of the trainers that support me. I’m grateful for my family here and back in Mexico. My agent Craig O’Bryan has been really good to me and has worked really hard to get some good mounts for me. I appreciate that, too. And the horses. I’ve had all of this success because of them. I just feel really good and hopefully I can win many more races.”

Then in June Hernandez flew across the pond and rode three races at Royal Ascot. Over the past year or so, Juan had become Wesley Ward’s go-to guy when the trainer brought horses out west. One such horse was Bacio, a 3-year-old colt by Maclean’s Music. When Ward decided to take Bacio over to Ascot, he asked if Hernandez and O’Bryan were on board.

“When I started back in Mexico I never imagined I would go ride over there,” Hernandez says of his trip to England. “I didn’t even know there were races over there. But then I moved here and watched those big races on TV and thought that looked so cool. My agent called me and asked if I wanted to go ride over there and I said ‘sure’ right away. We got a win and that made my trip beautiful.”

Bacio won the Palace of Holyroodhouse Handicap.

This will be Hernandez’ sixth year riding fulltime at Del Mar. He says his goals are still the same as when he first moved his tack here in 2020.

“My first goal at Del Mar is to win more races than last year,” Hernandez claims. “Try and break the number of wins I had the year before. So hopefully I’ll win at least one more and keep improving every year. After that it’s just win those big races. Ride hard and win the stakes races.”

It might be a bit tougher for Hernandez to exceed his 45 wins from 2025. There’s been a significant upgrade to the jockey colony this year with the addition of Hall of Famer Joel Rosario, Julien Leparoux, Joe Bravo, and Emisael Jaramillo.

“I think we have a really good quality group in here this year,” Hernandez observes. “I think it’s going to be challenging. Some good jockeys are showing up and joining the good jockeys that were already here.

“I like it,” Hernandez continues. “I think it’s good for everybody. Good for the trainers, good for the owners, good for the betting public and good for me because I like to challenge myself. You always improve when you’re riding with good riders. I’m just going to keep riding hard and hopefully get the best of every horse here.”

Just what you would expect from a seven-time riding champion.

COOLING OUT: There were two late scratches (Mc Vay and Full Serrano) in today’s San Diego ‘Cap, meaning favored Journalism now only has four rivals to beat. It also means his morning line odds have gone from 1/1 to 3/5…A couple of horses who have run at Del Mar in the past are in the news this weekend. Rebel Romance, a globetrotting superstar and winner of the 2024 Breeders’ Cup Turf at Del Mar, has been retired from racing. The 8-year-old gelding, who was awarded the Eclipse Award for top Turf horse in ’24, also won the BC Turf in 2022 at Keeneland and ran second in the race at Del Mar last year. The son of Dubawi closes out his stellar career with earnings exceeding $15 million…Bentornato, winner of last fall’s Breeders’ Cup Sprint at Del Mar, has suffered a sesamoid injury and will not run for the remainder of 2026. He ran second in the Sprint at Del Mar in 2024. The connections say they hope the speedster will return to the races in 2027…A busy morning on the worktab as 247 horses put in official workouts on Del Mar’s main track Saturday. Notable works – Dr. Venkman (4f, :48.60); Grand Slam Smile (4f, :49.20); Speedy Wilson (4f, :49.80); Inshallah (5f, 1:00.20); Nevada Beach (5f, :59.00) and Stronghold (5f, 1:00.80).