It is not uncommon for jockeys to hit the road from their customary circuit for the opportunity to ride a top prospect. Other times riders will hop on a flight for a coveted mount, most often for a rewarding opportunity in a stakes race.
Jockey Rocco Bowen also travels by plane for work—this summer on a bi-weekly basis—though in his case it might be to ride a low- or mid-level horse at Emerald Downs or at JACK Thistledown, tracks more than 2,000 miles apart.
While the customary workload for a rider might be to ride four or five days a week, depending on how often a track’s scheduled, the indefatigable Bowen has kept up a hectic schedule with cross-country travel that has kept him in the saddle for racing every day since July 3.
No wonder his friend and past agent Penny Fitch-Hayes will note on social media, “WITW is Rocco Bowen?”—the acronym standing for ‘where in the world.’
The safe bet for an answer is at a racetrack or an airport or perhaps both in a given day, as was the case July 13 when he spoke with BloodHorse, as he waited to board a flight from Cleveland to Seattle. He rode at Thistledown in North Randall, Ohio, earlier in the day.
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He had four scheduled rides at Emerald Downs in Auburn, Wash., just outside of Seattle, the following day.
According to Bowen, he will typically fly to Seattle on Thursday evening before returning to Cleveland on a Sunday red-eye flight that gets him into Ohio in the early Monday morning hours.
He also embarks on some car travel to other tracks when the opportunity arises. A trip to Presque Isle Downs is an hour and a half from Thistledown by automobile, with Hawthorne Race Course in the Chicago metropolitan area about six hours away or a short flight. Bowen has a home in Chicago.
The rider utilizes multiple jockey agents at his two principal bases, with Dudley Osborne booking mounts at Emerald Downs and Cory Hayes performing those duties at Thistledown.
Competing at so many tracks is hard work, but “It’s actually pretty fun, too,” Bowen said when reached via telephone in the Cleveland airport July 13 after he had ridden one race at Thistledown earlier in the afternoon. He won at a maiden race there the day before on Michael Friedman’s Flash of Cherokee for trainer Kim Puhl.
“I tell you, the kid’s got an unlimited amount of energy,” Emerald Downs trainer Dan Markle said of the 34-year-old Bowen. “He just smiles. He has a great attitude.”
Bowen is making up for lost time a bit after being sidelined in the spring when he broke his pelvis in five places during a late March accident in the starting gate at yet another track where he rides in the winter and spring—Oaklawn Park in Arkansas. His mount, the lightly raced maiden Paid Double , was scratched at the gate after rearing and flipping over, pinning him against the gate and sending him to the hospital.
“It was just a freak deal,” Bowen said.
Bowen celebrates a victory aboard Bennykayandsuzytoo in an allowance race at Oaklawn Park
Bowen said his doctor told him he would likely be away from riding until August, but he was able to return sooner than expected after rehabilitation. He credited the support he received from his fellow riders and participants at Oaklawn, and from doctors and nurses involved in his care.
“They really cut my time down to half. They helped me have a speedy recovery,” Bowen said.
West Coast-based trainer Jeff Metz recalled posing for a picture in May at Emerald with Bowen, as the rider moved about on crutches. Both have won multiple meet titles at the Washington track, with Bowen topping the standings over three consecutive years from 2016-18. Metz is a four-time training champion there.
“He wasn’t really getting around that well and then his agent said, ‘Hey, he’s gonna come back to riding and this and that.’ And I know my owner was a little wary because he hadn’t ridden,” Metz said. “But the one thing I know about horses and athletes is when they put their mind to it, they know their body, and they’re going to be ready when it comes time.”
Trainer Jeff Metz at the 2019 January Horses of All Ages Sale at Keeneland
It was Metz who put Bowen on his first winner following the pelvic injury when Letha and Steve Haahr’s Royal Candy won a maiden claiming race June 24 at Emerald Downs, just four days after he resumed riding.
“It was pretty cool, man,” Bowen said. “Between both of us, I’d say we have at least 300 wins together at Emerald.”
Through racing on Thursday, Bowen had ridden 14 winners from 145 mounts this year. He has 1,152 victories in the United States and Canada after beginning riding in his native Barbados. Those figures come despite a debilitating army injury in September 2018 that kept him out of the saddle for approximately a year and a half.
He entered racing on Friday with four wins at Emerald, another two at Presque Isle Downs, one at Thistledown, and seven at Oaklawn.
Bowen said riding at Emerald grants him an opportunity to spend time with his three children who live in the Pacific Northwest, and the track is one of his favorites due to his success there.
“‘Course we have fifty granders every weekend here and of course, the (Longacres) Mile coming. That’s the big race here,” Markle said of racing at Emerald Downs. “He’s trying to get his foot in the door and have a banner day on Mile Day.”
A Markle-trained horse, Arma d’Oro , could be his ticket back to the $150,000 Longacres Mile, a race Bowen won in 2021 with Background for trainer Michael Puhich—at least Markle hopes so. The Violence gelding, who races for the estate of Glyn Kelly, Anne MacLennan, and Len Strandley Jr., rallied to win a July 9 allowance optional claiming race, speeding 6 1/2 furlongs under Bowen in 1:14.37.
Bowen aboard Background after his win in the 2021 Longacres Mile at Emerald Downs
Metz, who has raced horses this year in Washington, Arizona, and California, reflected on the itinerary kept by Bowen that can keep the rider traveling so much.
“I used to see it in California with the jockeys going out of town for the stakes, but not for $2,500 and $3,500 claimers,” he said. “When he came (to Emerald) the first weekend, and he rode in the stakes race for me, he said, ‘I’m going to try and do something that nobody’s ever done.’ So he wants to try and do this. Now how long he can maintain that schedule? Because again, it’s not a short flight, and it’s one thing to do it once a month for stakes races, but it’s another to do it every week.
“As a trainer, I have done it back and forth every week for quite a long time. But again, I don’t have to ride the races. I don’t have to put out that exertion. I have assistants that are in place in case something happens and my flight gets delayed and I can’t make it.”
“He’s always been real energetic,” Markle said of Bowen. “He’s a breath of fresh air—not one of these sour riders. Here comes Rocco, bouncing around—got a good attitude and that transfers to a horse, too. They know when somebody’s happy. And he tries so hard. He gets that second effort out of them. They may get tired, but he can still try harder.”
