Update on Legendary Jockey Irad Jr. Ortiz Brings Heartbreaking News For Horse Racing Season

For Mike Repole, the 2025 Jockey Club Gold Cup race lasted not even a furlong. No  glory was to be on offer for the trainer who just 24 hours ago had experienced one of the best moments of his horse racing career. He wished Mindframe would repeat what Fierceness did at the Pacific Classic on August 30. Instead, a bad bump would throw rider Irad Ortiz Jr. off the mount and onto the track.

From that moment onwards, it was all about the jockey who could have gotten more damage had Chad Brown’s Sierra Leone done more than just graze him until on the gallop. Ortiz was carried off the track and to an ambulance, from where he was taken to the Albany Medical Center. The iconic jockey’s agent, Steve Rushing, later shared the following message: “Looks like he escaped serious injury. He’s still waiting on one more test. He’s cleared to ride. We will see how he feels in the morning.”

Well, the Monday verdict is here, and it’s definitely come with the Monday blues. Steve Byk shared the update on X on September 1st. “Per agent Steve Rushing, @iradortiz will be off his mounts today and return Thursday at @KYDownsRacing”. So, the high-intensity fall did end up doing some lasting damage. In fact, the 33-year-old was complaining of wrist and rib pain after the massive fall.

Steve Byk gave further details of the races Ortiz was supposed to be on the saddle for. On Labor Day itself, the 2-time Belmont Stakes winner jockey was supposed to ride in 11 races. But instead, the Breeders’ Cup Classic winner will take time to heal from the horrific ordeal. And he is targeting a return to the tracks on Thursday, September 4th, when he has 10 races lined up at the Kentucky Downs, including the Mint One Dreamer Stakes.

But is there a chance the injury setback can extend beyond Thursday? We can’t say for sure. All we know is what happened on Sunday. The G1 race at the Saratoga started like any other. But the domino effect started when Chad Brown’s Phileas Fogg started to veer to the left and force his way through the congestion to the front. Aboard Phileas Fogg was jockey Kendrick Carmouche, who wanted it so bad that he forced Contrary Thinking to shift left.

The Dylan Davis thoroughbred had no space and bumped into White Abarrio, almost unsitting jockey, Edgard Zayas. In turn, the momentum carried over to Mindframe, and as fate would downloads on the dirt track. And Sierra Leone’s galloping legs almost took out the Mindframe jockey, too. But Flavien Prat maneuvered out a few paths, which ended up being detrimental to Sierra Leoþne’s Gold Cup charge.

But we are not here to talk about the race. Rather, this is about jockeys and their recent misfortunes.

Like Irad Ortiz, another jockey has a bad day

Not just Irad Ortiz. Across the Atlantic, another jockey has to deal with an injury setback. And this one is a rather big one, considering that Ryan Moore is the preferred jockey for trainer Aidan O’Brien. The equation had been a very simple one: Coolmore horses plus trainer Aidan O’Brien plus jockey Ryan Moore meant consistent success.

But with the crucial Irish Champions Festival and St Leger starting in a week, the news coming out of Moore having a stress fracture has to be bad timing. Talking to Racing TV on August 30, Aidan O’Brien said, “He had a scan yesterday, and when they did the scan, they found the fracture in his femur.”

Right now, the Ballydoyle trainer is not that stressed as he has found a replacement. Meanwhile, Moore nurses the issue that had been bothering him since the Irish Derby weekend.  Incidentally, Moore had also had his recent ordeals of being flipped off the saddle while in Germany aboard Garden of Eden. And his Irish trainer connection thinks that could have aggravated the stress fracture in the right femur.

Unlike Irad Ortiz, this one will take time, which will rule the Irish jockey out for almost the entirety of the flat season. Speedy recovery to both the star jockeys, who make their thoroughbreds tick so efficiently.