By T. D. Thornton
Leading Oaklawn Park jockey Ricardo Santana Jr., whose 77 wins and $3.2 million in purse earnings are nearly double the totals of his next closest competitor at the Arkansas track, owns a statistical lock on the local riding title going into the closing weekend of the season.
But if Santana is to aim for a fifth consecutive Oaklawn jockey title in 2017, he will have to overcome a significant series of suspensions recently handed down by the Oaklawn stewards: On Wednesday, he was barred from competing for the first 10 days of the 2017 meet because of two separate five-day penalties for rough riding.
In addition, Santana already has an appeal pending for a three-day infraction handed down earlier in the meet, which, if that penalty also carries over, could mean he'd be out of the saddle at Oaklawn next year until Feb. 3, 2017.
Thirteen days out of a 57-day meet represents roughly 22 percent of Oaklawn's entire 2017 season.
The separate incidents on Apr. 8 and 9 in which Santana caused rivals to check severely to avoid colliding or clipping heels were Santana's second and third violations of the meet of state racing rule #2347(a), which deals with “interference or intimidation.” Because Santana was cited for a similar infraction in a Mar. 5 race, the stewards wrote in each of this week's rulings that “this is considered an aggravating circumstance warranting a longer suspension.”
The stewards further ruled that “because the 2016 race meet is about to conclude, the suspension days are being carried over to the opening of the 2017 race meet at Oaklawn Park.”
And there might be yet another sanction in the pipeline for Santana: After Wednesday's rulings came out, he was disqualified from second to third in that afternoon's ninth race for causing a rival to check.
Santana has three days to appeal. He is booked on 18 mounts over the final two days of the 2016 Oaklawn season, 14 of them for leading trainer Steve Asmussen.
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