John Velazquez Birthdate: Nov. 24, 1971 Birthplace: Carolina, Puerto Rico Residence: West Hempstead, N.Y. Family: wife, Leona; daughter, Lerina; son. Michael Patrick.

2006 Gulfstream Record

   Career:

• Unseated in 2007 as the nation’s champion jockey after winning the Eclipse Award in 2005 and ‘06. He also slipped from the top spot in the Gulfstream standings last year, finishing fourth in the standings, but with the highest win percentage among regular jockeys.

• What he lost in championship numbers he made up for in championship races, getting his first career Triple Crown win aboard Rags to Riches in the Belmont Stakes and winning the John Deere Breeders’ Cup Turf aboard English Channel.

• Set a record in 2005 with more than $24 million in purses while riding first-call for Todd Pletcher.

• Through November, won 29 stakes in 2007 including six at Gulfstream, most in that role as Pletcher’s top jockey.

• Won the Fountain of Youth aboard Scat Daddy and the Richter Scale Handicap on Half Ours, both on Spectacular Saturday III last year.

• He also was aboard when English Channel started his 2007 campaign with a near world record performance in an allowance race here as well as eventual champion older horse Lawyer Ron at the start of his championship campaign.

• His Gulfstream trophies sit on the mantle alongside championships at Keeneland and eight in New York (including the record for wins in a meet at Saratoga in 2004).

• Before his victory on English Channel last fall, his previous two wins in the 2004 Breeders’ Cup World Championship – Ashado in the Distaff and Speightstown in the Sprint – earned him the Bill Shoemaker Award for the day’s top jockey. It was the second time Velazquez had won two races on a Breeders’ Cup card, the first coming in 2002 with wins in Juvenile Fillies (Storm Flag Flying) and Filly and Mare Turf (Starine). Other Breeders’ Cup wins came in 1998 Mile on Da Hoss and 2000 Juvenile Fillies with Caressing.

• On Sept. 3, 2001, he became first jockey in Saratoga history to ride six winners on a single card, capping day off with victory in Diana Handicap on Starine. He won his 3,000th career race on July 29, 2004 at Saratoga on “John Velazquez Bobblehead Doll Day.”

   
  Other: Entered jockey school in native Puerto Rico in June 1988 and two years later rode first winner at El Commandant on Rodas in 1990. He came to New York in 1990 and was guided by Hall of Fame jockey Angel Cordero Jr., who is now his agent. He is the son-in-law of trainer Leo O’Brien. He is the president of the Jockeys’ Guild and, together with his wife, helped organize fund-raisers for Guild charities through sales of autographed hats and shirts throughout the Gulfstream meet.