Columnist Ralph Siraco: 'Eddie D.' pounding on door of 6,000-win club

Ralph Siraco's horse racing column appears Monday and his Southern California selections run Tuesday through Friday on the scoreboard page. Write to him c/o Las Vegas Sun, 800 S. Valley View Blvd., Las Vegas, NV 89107.

Michael Jordan retired, Mike Tyson returned, and Eddie Delahoussaye never left.

"Eddie D.," as he is affectionately known to the race-playing community, has no immediate plans of retiring and he has never been close to leaving his lifelong craft of riding thoroughbred racehorses.

The 47-year-old jockey has stayed so long that he is about to tread where only 13 other riders have ever gone.

Delahoussaye is about to join a baker's dozen of horse racing's hall of fame riders in the exclusive and somewhat elusive 6,000-win club.

Eddie D. has ridden against 10 of the 13 jockeys who have achieved that plateau in a professional riding career that has spanned just over three decades.

We say "professional" because the New Iberia, Louisiana, native was riding quarter horses six years before his official saddle career started -- at the tender and impressionable age of 11 in the backwood bush-league tracks of the bayou.

His first recognized thoroughbred victory came at Evangeline Downs on June 29, 1968 on a horse named Brown Shill. Since then Delahoussaye has racked up 5,994 winners, and that has taken him to the threshold of the club.

Bill Shoemaker sits on top of the list as the winningest jockey of all time with 8,833 victories. Laffit Pincay, Jr., who is zeroing in on the Shoe, has over 8,688 wins and sits second. Pat Day (3rd), David Gall (4th), and Angel Cordero, Jr. (5th) have all cracked the 7,000-win barrier while Jorge Velasquez (6th), Chris McCarron (7th), Sandy Hawley (8th), Russell Baze (9th), Larry Snyder (10th), Carl Gambardella (11th), Earlie Fires (12th) and John Longden (13th) complete the club.

In recounting his accomplished career, Delahoussaye recalls riding against most of the club members but never competed against Gambardella or Gall and states that Longden retired before he started riding.

After dominating in his homeland at the historic Fairgrounds, Eddie D. ventured to compete in the Midwest at Churchill Downs and Arlington Park before moving his tack to the most competitive jockey colony in America. Sitting on a 1978 national championship with 384 winners, Eddie D.'s move to Southern California followed in 1979.

Ironically, Delahoussaye's pinnacle moments came at Churchill Downs and Arlington Park.

In 1981 Delahoussaye rode The Bart in America's first million-dollar race -- the Arlington Million at Arlington Park -- against his best friend Shoemaker, who was astride the famous John Henry. In one of the most exciting finishes in racing, and the most exciting finish in the history of the race, John Henry put his nose out to beat The Bart by the slimmest margin imaginable, so much so that track announcer Phil Georgeff thought The Bart had won.

The following year, Delahoussaye won the Kentucky Derby aboard Gato Del Sol and repeated that feat the very next year, in 1983 with Sonny's Halo, to become only the fourth rider in history to take back-to-back Derbies.

Seven Breeders' Cup victories and many more personal milestone memories make Delahoussaye one of the most popular riders in America and his patented come- from-behind cliff-hanging rides have made him a legend among horseplayers.

Maybe the best compliment to Delahoussaye came from one of his fiercest competitors, jockey Gary Stevens, who after riding and studying his senior for over 15 years admits, "All these years riding against him, and I still can't tell how much horse he has underneath him. I'll come up behind him and I haven't got a clue."

Race fans -- along with Eddie D. -- have had a clue for over 31 years and almost 6,000 victories.

COAST CONTEST: The Coast Resorts casinos continue their $15,000 weekly handicapping contests with the next stop on Wednesday at the Orleans hotel-casino's race book.

Each week through the entire Santa Anita season, a free handicapping contest on the last five races at the Southern California track will offer a $1,000 prize. The contests will rotate through the three Coast Resorts properties' race books during the run.

Most of the contests will be held on the Wednesday racing programs except when the track is dark. That week's contest will be held on Thursday.

After this Wednesday's free $1,000 offering at the Orleans the following schedule is left for the weekly competitions:

The Gold Coast race book on Feb. 3 and 24, March 17 and April 7.

The Barbary Coast race book on Feb. 10, March 3 and 24 and Thursday, April 15.

The Orleans race book repeats on Thursday, Feb. 18, March 10 and 31.

A total of $15,000 is up for grabs in the handicapping contests at the Coasts.

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