When two siblings ride stakes winners at a track on the same card, more often than not it is the dynamic duo of Irad Ortiz Jr. and his brother, Jose—both Eclipse Award-winning jockeys.
But they aren't the ones. On April 10 at Keeneland, brothers Brian Hernandez Jr. and younger brother, Colby, managed the unique accomplishment. Colby notched his first Keeneland stakes win on Change of Control in the $100,000 Giant's Causeway Stakes, a half-hour before Brian recorded his 12th Keeneland stakes triumph when he rode King Fury to victory in the $200,000 Stonestreet Lexington Stakes (G3).
It wasn't the first time the two won stakes on a specific card, suspects Brian, the elder of the two.
"I am sure we had won stakes on the same program on some Louisiana-bred stakes programs at Fair Grounds," he said.
Both are Louisiana natives that typically ride the winters at Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots in New Orleans, though Brian has also wintered at Gulfstream Park.
While Brian has largely kept to a two-state circuit of riding in Kentucky and Louisiana, Colby has mostly been based in Louisiana year-round, often riding at Evangeline Downs during the months when the major Kentucky racetracks, Keeneland and Churchill Downs, are in full swing. Before last year, Colby never "stuck it out," he said after testing the Kentucky circuit for short periods.
That changed last year when Louisiana racing was on hold with the onset of COVID-19, leaving Kentucky as one of a limited number of spring options when Churchill Downs resumed racing in mid-May.
Brian "has always encouraged me, that I'm a good enough to ride to be up here," Colby told turf publicity Jennie Rees in an interview last fall shortly before the jockey rode in his first Breeder's Cup.
His first Breeders' Cup experience, coming in the Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint (G1T), resulted in him riding Just Might to a last-place finish in the field of 14. It wasn't the desired outcome, but it was a start.
Brian has already won a Breeders' Cup race, piloting Janis Whitham's Fort Larned to a frontrunning victory in the $5 million Breeders' Cup Classic (G1) in 2012 at Santa Anita Park for trainer Ian Wilkes.
Colby's Breeder's Cup ride on Just Might came for trainer Michelle Lovell, a co-owner in the sprinter with Griffon Farms, and he teamed with a Lovell trainee again Saturday with Change of Control. The latter is owned by Horseshoe Racing.
Brian's stakes victory on Saturday on King Fury came on a 3-year-old owned by Fern Creek Stables and Three Chimneys Farm and trained by Kenny McPeek, a longtime backer of the rider. Brian has been aboard the son of Curlin in five of six starts, including when seventh in the TVG Breeders' Cup Juvenile Presented by Thoroughbred Aftercare Alliance (G1) last fall at Keeneland.
He knows King Fury well, and he can also recall the colt's dam, millionaire and grade 1-winning Flatter mare Taris. In winning the Lexus Raven Run Stakes (G2) at Keeneland by nine lengths in 2014, Taris blitzed seven furlongs in 1:21.32, then a track record.
"I remember sitting in the jocks' room after the race and watching her run," Brian said. "It was one of the more impressive races at Keeneland."
Taris' track record stood until November when future champion Gamine won the Breeders' Cup Filly and Mare Sprint (G1) by 6 1/4 lengths in 1:20.20.
