Jockey Norberto Arroyo Jr., on the comeback trail after serving a prison sentence for cocaine possession, earned his 1,000th career win Dec. 8 aboard favored Mac the Man at Turfway Park.
The 6-5 choice in the 6 1/2-furlong allowance test for 2-year-olds, Mac the Man made a sweeping move on the turn to get home first by 8 1/2 lengths in the 10th race.
The winner's circle was crowded with family and fans wishing Arroyo well. The jockey's success on the racetrack periodically has been sidetracked by legal troubles, most recently a 30-month prison sentence for a drug conviction handed down in New York in 2010.
He was released after one year and returned to riding this fall on the strength of a conditional license granted by the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission. It's an opportunity he recognizes and appreciates.
"Nobody has any idea what this means to me," said Arroyo, married and the father of four. "These last three-and-a-half years have been very, very tough, not only on me but on my family. I put my kids through hell by making the mistake I made and going away. Nobody thought that I would get back, but when times seemed impossible, I never lost my faith in God, and I knew it was going to happen sometime. Right now what's happening is God's will, so let it be done.
"The horse racing industry is going to see an Arroyo they've never seen before. I finally learned my lesson. I learned it the hard way, but I learned it."
Arroyo, a 35-year-old native of Puerto Rico, began riding in 1999, winning with his third mount, Iron Lady, at Rockingham Park. He was runner-up for the Eclipse Award as Thoroughbred racing's leading apprentice in 2000 and was New York's leading rider that year.
Among Arroyo's 1,000 wins are 65 stakes races, 14 of them graded. Most of those trophies were earned in New York, but the biggest win of his career came at Turfway in 2003 aboard New York Hero in the $500,000 Lane's End Stakes (gr. II), now the grade III Spiral Stakes. Altogether, from 7,317 mounts, Arroyo has accumulated purse earnings of more than $38 million.
Arroyo immigrated to the United States with his family when he was 11 years old. He played baseball and basketball as a youngster but when he realized he would not gain the height to continue those sports, he shifted his attention to race riding. A cousin, Enrique Arroyo, now an East Coast-based trainer, was a leading rider in Puerto Rico in the mid-1980s and introduced him to the sport.
Arroyo intends to continue riding at Turfway through the track's winter meet, which ends March 30.
Mac the Man, a 2-year-old El Corredor colt, is trained by Jeff Greenhill for his wife, owner Sherri Greenhill. The win was his second in five starts, all on all-weather surfaces. Arroyo said the colt didn't look the best on form but warming up he knew he had the best horse.
"He's still learning how to run, really," the jockey said. "Leaving the half-mile pole I started to get a little bit into him, just helping him pay attention. Then at the three-eighths pole I started smooching at him, and from the quarter pole I didn't have to do much."
The race was a prep for the Turfway Prevue Stakes Jan. 5, the first of three races leading to the Spiral Stakes in March.