Jockey Albin Jimenez was issued a warning but no further disciplinary action was taken for not actively urging his mount, Impunity, during the second race at Indiana Grand Sept. 15, said Dan Fick, senior state steward at Indiana Grand.
Riding the 9-2 third favorite in the $5,000 claiming race, Jimenez had Impunity positioned just off the pace in third early in the six-furlong race, but as other horses mounted bids to his outside, the jockey remained largely motionless. Replays show Jimenez neither using his riding crop nor urging Impunity with his hands.
The 4-year-old gelding crossed the wire in seventh, beaten more than 15 lengths, in a race won by 52-1 longshot Off Sixes. The favorite, Elzabe's On Board, ran second.
Video of Impunity's race quickly circulated on Twitter, drawing the ire of frustrated horseplayers.
Can someone explain the ride on the #2 horse in the 2nd at Indiana?
— Thierry Henry (@frenchwaterbtl) September 15, 2020
I bet a jockey will have a good excuse for his colleague again. pic.twitter.com/g0zxip7gex
Fick said stewards reviewed film of the race with Jimenez on Sept. 21, and the rider told them he thought the horse was 'going bad'—or traveling uncomfortably—as the field raced during the middle of the turn.
"We told him that when you think a horse is going bad, there is one decision and that is to pull him up," Fick said. "That's the only right decision. We told him that is absolutely what you have to be thinking, and he's an experienced enough jockey to know that."
Fick said it would be a "serious offense" if Jimenez does not pull up a horse in the future if he suspects his mount is uncomfortable.
Impunity has since been examined by the track veterinarian, Fick said, though he declined to reveal the findings of that evaluation for publication.
Impunity, who had won for a $40,000 claiming price earlier this year, was making his third consecutive class drop after changing hands repeatedly via claims. He raced Sept. 15 for owner-trainer Benjie Larue, who had claimed him for $10,000 July 3 at Ellis Park from a race in which he ran third. He had not raced in the interim.
Trainer Genaro Garcia claimed him Sept. 15 for owners Southwest Racing Stables and Bruce Murphy, according to the Equibase chart. The chart comments made little mention of Impunity, only that the horse "saved ground to no avail."
Jimenez, whose biggest victory came aboard Knicks Go in the 2018 Claiborne Breeders' Futurity (G1) at Keeneland, has won riding titles at Indiana Grand and Turfway Park. He topped the standings at Turfway during its winter/spring meet that ended in March, the seventh time he has been leading rider there.
He is 5-for-52 at the current Indiana Grand meet after missing more than two months of riding after being injured in a multiple-horse spill June 17. Entering the Sept. 22 card there, he was 2-for 37 since returning Aug. 31.
