Oaklawn Park's leading rider, Cristian Torres won not only the Southwest Stakes (G3), a Kentucky Derby qualifying race, but the Martha Washington Stakes as well which afforded points to the Kentucky Oaks (GI) both for trainer Mark Casse. The races were rescheduled due to winter weather. The panel of racing experts voted Torres Jockey of the Week for Feb. 2-Feb. 8.
The weekly honor recognizes jockeys for significant riding accomplishments and who are members of the Jockeys' Guild. Founded in 1940, the Guild represents more than 1050 active, retired and permanently disabled jockeys in the United States.
On Friday, dual Hall of Fame trainer Casse gave a leg up to Torres aboard Search Party in the Martha Washington, the first in Oaklawn's series for three-year-old fillies. Breaking from post position three in the field of eight, Search Party settled in third along the rail. Stuck on the rail with nowhere to run, Torres angled Search Party out at the eighth pole and led a cavalry charge down the stretch to post a neck win in 1:45.56 for the mile and one-sixteenth.
"Great filly," said Torres to Oaklawn publicity. "She's very versatile. She can run on the pace, stalk. Great filly to ride. She responded today. She showed up. I knew I had a lot of horse underneath me."
The Casse/Torres duo scored their second stakes win in the Southwest Stakes (G3) on Silent Tactic. Off at odds of 12-1 in the field of 12, Silent Tactic raced near the back of the field after breaking a step slow. Approaching the final turn, Silent Tactic began picking off his rivals and swept past the competition to post a 3-1/4 length win in 1:44.85 for the mile and one-sixteenth.
"I worked him before we had the break and he worked beautiful that day," Torres said. "So I was pretty confident coming into this race in his fitness. I knew there was going to be a lot of pace in the race, so I was not worried about wherever I was going to be."
A native of Puerto Rico, Torres, 28, is a former exercise rider for Casse. He posted his first win at Gulfstream Park on April 21, 2019. Torres won his first leading rider title at Remington Park in 2022. He won his first Oaklawn leading rider title during the 2022-2023 season and again during the 2023-2024 season. He is currently in first place in the standings just ahead of last year's leading rider, Francisco Arrieta.
Torres will be riding at his winter base of Oaklawn Friday and Saturday then travel to Sunland Park for Sunland Park Derby Day on Sunday and mounts in four stakes races including the Sunland Park Derby aboard Bricklin for trainer Rodolphe Brisset.
Other contenders for Jockey of the Week included Kendrick Carmouche with two stakes wins at Aqueduct, Florent Geroux who recently relocated to ride in southern California and won the Robert B. Lewis (G3), Irad Ortiz, Jr. with three stakes wins at Tampa Bay and Flavien Prat with three stakes wins at three different tracks: Santa Anita, Tampa Bay and Oaklawn.
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