Larry Jones Reflects As He Nears 1000 Winners

If people are the sum of their life experiences, with stories built upon one another like the chapters within an anthology, or levels to a skyscraper, then the nearly 1,000 victories trainer Larry Jones has tallied tell a tale of greatness and assemble a construction of character. Built through intense trials, from the ill-fated Eight Belles (Unbridled's Song) to his own hospitalization after a life-threatening accident, Jones has fortified his portfolio with faith and surrounded himself with enough material to keep building.

A farmer turned racehorse trainer, who became a three-time Kentucky Oaks winner, Jones has cultivated an enviable 19.6% career strike rate, while counting 23% of his graded victories in Grade I events – 14 total. The 59-year-old native of Hopkinsville, Kentucky, has embodied the quality-over-quantity maxim since bursting onto the big stage with his first Grade I performer, 2002 Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies also-ran and subsequent Grade II winner Ruby's Reception (Rubiano). He has gone on to start a beaten favorite in the Kentucky Derby, finish second in the Run for the Roses twice, earn a pair of runner-up finishes in Breeders' Cup races – including the 2007 Classic with Hard Spun (Danzig) – and earn the Big Sport of Turfdom Award.
“My first horse was a filly named Ala Turf (Turfway) in 1981 and I was just an owner training her a little on the farm,” Jones recollected. “I bought her as a 2-year-old for a whopping $700. I never was an assistant to anyone, I was just an owner who one day made the comment to the guy training her at the track about what he was doing wrong and his attitude was 'if you think you can do better, you do it' – and here we are now.

“We've had a few lean years – a few where we only grossed about $3,300 – and we worked our way up, but it wasn't until we got a horse like Ruby's Reception that things started to take off,” Jones continued. “I don't train for people I don't like and I have to be the most fortunate trainer in the world with the owners I have. People like Rick Porter (of Fox Hill Farm), Brereton C. Jones, Fletcher and Carolyn Gray and Tommy Ligon make my job a lot of fun because they are friends and there are no finer people in the world. I like them, I like my job and that's why I come to work.”

“Larry always gets the most out of the horse with what they have to offer,” Porter commented. “I will never forget when Eight Belles wasn't switching leads in a race. He said 'alright – that's it – no one else is getting on this horse except me', and she switched leads next out won by a pole. He knows how to train them physically, is hands-on in everything that goes on in his barn and is great with the media. He's the whole package.”

“Larry has forgotten more about training horses than a lot of trainers will know in a lifetime,” added former Kentucky governor Brereton C. Jones. “He's a hard worker who is a major part of my operation and there's no way to improve on his character. He's simply a superior human being and deserves all of his success.”

A unique aspect of Jones's prosperity is that he still, despite straddling the cusp of sexagenarian-hood, gallops his charges in the morning. In 2015, he was aboard Oaks winner Lovely Maria (Majesticperfection) and Eclipse Award finalist I'm a Chatterbox (Munnings) throughout their campaigns, just as he had done for 2011 Horse of the Year Havre de Grace (Saint Liam), the aforementioned Eight Belles and runaway 2008 Oaks victress Proud Spell (Proud Citizen).

“My style is to let the horse be a horse,” Jones explained. “They go through all the disciplines like where to switch leads. When I gallop them, I try to go around the track as if they'd be out in the field running on their own. They stay a lot more sound doing that. Some people have criticized that I may gallop quickly, but those are the same people who remark that our horses look happy with their ears up. To me, that's a compliment.

“I'm not living life on the edge still galloping these horses, I just know that connecting with them to trust a rider and training on horseback has made me a different trainer than I would have been,” he continued. “It's about what they've taught me about training, not what I've taught them.”

On the edge of life is just how his many tribulations have made the 62-time graded stakes winner feel. From Eight Belles – a filly flirting with stardom who broke down just after a game second against the boys in the 2008 Kentucky Derby – to nearly losing his own life from a training accident-caused brain hemorrhage, Jones has peered over the margins of mortality and drawn on his faith to help him procure perspective.

“I had a hard time with my faith when Eight Belles happened,” Jones poignantly reflected. “It was more than I could handle and it was God that got me through it. He let me know that it was in his plans and got me at ease with it. We didn't do anything wrong with her and a lot of good came out of it for the game. She was not on any steroids or illegal medications, but she became the catalyst for positive changes in medication rules and helped the industry. It was a tough time for us, but hopefully it made horseracing better through our suffering.

“My faith affects me every day in what I do,” he continued. “I try to think `what would Jesus do in this situation', even if I don't always get it perfect. I know when I got hurt so badly, he saved me and that it was in his plans. The doctor said my kind of recovery doesn't happen very often, but I turned the corner on Easter Sunday and a lot of things happened that day that people have trouble believing. This is a great game, but it's very trying and can bring out the worst in people. I just hope that when it brings out the worst in me, he can lead me back.”

Jones is quick to point out that it is also the athletes themselves who have put him where he is today.

“The best all-around horse I've ever been around, without a doubt, was Havre de Grace,” Jones reflected. “She was the nearest thing to a perfect horse I'll ever touch. She gave me the least to worry of any horse, but she was so good I worried all the time. Hard Spun was the fastest and I was convinced he could have been a champion sprinter had we went that route, but could carry that up to a mile and a quarter. Proud Spell was the hardest-trying horse I've been around and was a little package who thought she could – and she did. Lord only knows how good Eight Belles was going to be. She went from getting beat to winning races by 10 lengths and was just getting good. She'll always be – like so many of these horses for many different reasons – very special to me. I was very fortunate to get to gallop all of these, myself. I knew them, they knew me and we always found a way to work together.”

Going into the third week of March, Jones sits at 996 victories – just four short of his first major career victory mark. Still, one visit to his barn and it is easy to see a lack of trophies touting his accomplishments. The building blocks of his success are on four legs behind the webbings of his 40-stall barn. From returning GI winner I'm a Chatterbox, to 2016 Oaks hopeful Midnight On Oconee (Midnight Lute) and even his homebred Jensen (Haynesfield), who will try to stamp his ticket to the Derby in next month's GII Spiral, they are the cumulative chapters in his career aggregate, each with their own story to add.

“When I took a year off with health issues and retired, I found out that I really like horses,” he concluded. “No matter how upset I may ever get at the game with all the hustle and bustle, they are the reason I do it. No matter how tiring it can be, even when shipping across the country from New Orleans to Houston to Saratoga Springs, I remember that that's why I got into it. The horses are the center and climbing on top of them is the best part of my day.”