HORSE RACING-Leading trainers predict success for Walcott in Woodbine move

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EDMONTON, Canada, CMC – Veteran conditioners Robertino Diodoro and Rod Cone have backed outstanding Barbadian jockey Rico Walcott to excel at Woodbine Racetrack in the campaign starting next month.

The 34-year-old Walcott has spent the last 16 years on the Alberta racing scene in western Canada, dominating the now-defunct Northlands Park and the recently opened Century Mile.

When Woodbine gets underway on April 22, Barbadian Walcott will be the newest member of the jockey colony.

“He rides the cheap horses as hard as he rides the ones in stakes races,” said Cone, who has won Alberta’s richest stakes race – the Canadian Derby – four times.

“I know he’s won races for me. I never expected to win. He never looks at the odds board and thinks, ‘this horse is 20-1 and has no shot.’ He has a positive attitude every time he climbs on. I’d ride him on every horse I run if I could get him.”

He continued: “Who wouldn’t [want to]? I’ve always said he could go anywhere he wants to go to ride and win races. Toronto will not be any different.

“He’ll be just fine. He’ll do well. He’ll fit right in. He’s as good a rider as there is in Canada.”

Walcott has racked up astonishing numbers over the years in Alberta. He won five Canadian Derbies – in 2010, 2013, 2014, 2018, and 2022 – his last success being his first capture of the race at Century Mile which was opened in 2019.

He won eight titles at Northlands, has added two more at Century, and has ridden 1524 winners for purse earnings of around CAN$20 million.

Diodoro, who also has a barn in the United States at Hot Springs, Arkansas, said success was sure to follow Walcott to Toronto.

“I’d be shocked if he wasn’t successful,” Diodoro said.

“I just wish he would have done it earlier. We asked him 100 times to come to Oaklawn.

He will do very well. He has all the tools. He has so much talent. And, he is very personable.”

Walcott’s long-standing agent, Bob Fowlis, said he and the champion rider had forged a close partnership since coming together 11 years ago.

“Rico was like my own son for a long time. He’s a great rider,” he said.

“I’ve been fortunate to have had a lot of great riders. Rico, Rickey (Walcott), and Quincy Welch, a leading rider in Alberta who won just under 2,000 races, were all from Barbados.

“They were three of the top five jockeys to ever ride in Alberta.

“Rico is just so talented. It’s incredible how much he gets out of horses. Like any good jockey, he’s solid and sits a horse well. I wish him nothing but the best.

“I hope everything works out well in Toronto and with his health.”

In 2019, Walcott underwent surgery for a brain tumor and missed the season.

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