Why I’m rooting for jockey Mike Smith in the 2026 KY Derby — and you should, too
Long ago, I internalized the definitive axiom of sportswriting: There’s no cheering in the press box.
Yet here are the 10 reasons why I will be rooting, silently, for jockey Mike Smith to boot trainer Mark Glatt’s So Happy across the finish line first in Saturday’s 152nd Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs:
1. That ‘80s show. When Smith, now 59, rode in the Kentucky Derby for the first time, the average price of a gallon of gas was $1.21. The number one song on the Billboard Hot 100 was “Against All Odds” by Phil Collins. America’s No. 1 movie was “Breakin,” a breakdancing film.
It was May 5, 1984, and a teenaged Smith rode Pine Circle to a sixth-place finish.
Who could have dreamed that was the launch of a Derby riding career that, 42 years later, is ongoing?
2. The Derby taunted Smith. One of the best riders of his generation, Smith went two decades being haunted by his Kentucky Derby experiences.
In 1993 and 1994, the Roswell, New Mexico, native lost on the race favorites. The second of those defeats was especially tormenting. Smith’s horse, Holy Bull, entered the Derby considered a budding “super-horse.”
After a shockingly listless performance, Holy Bull came home 12th, an outcome that ate at Smith for years.
If that weren’t anguish enough, three times between 1993 and 2004, Smith finished second in the Kentucky Derby and once was third.
Yet the victory every North American jockey most craves continually eluded him.
3. A catastrophic fall. On Aug. 31, 1998, Smith was riding a 5-year-old mare, Dacron, in the 9th Race at Saratoga Race Course.
In what was a $40,000 turf race, a veering-in rival created a chain reaction that ended when Smith’s horse dumped him into the Saratoga hedge — then fell directly on top of him.
The jockey suffered two fractured vertebrae in his back, lived in a body cast for months and was sidelined from riding for half a calendar year.
In 2005, I was in a gaggle of reporters around Smith when the jockey was asked a question that few humans are in position to answer:
What does it feel like when a horse falls on top of you?
“It hurts real bad,” Smith said.
4. A Cinderella story. On May 7, 2005, the Kentucky Derby gods repaid Smith for his previous tribulations with one of the sweetest moments in Run for the Roses history.
Smith’s 12th Derby mount was a 50-1 long shot named Giacomo. The horse was special to Smith, however, because his sire was Holy Bull — the beaten favorite Smith had ridden in the 1994 Kentucky Derby.
Riding the Derby with a “Holy Bull” T-shirt underneath his racing silks, Smith let Giacomo drop back to 18th in the 20-horse field, then guided the long shot through an obstacle course of flailing horse’s hooves to a victory almost no one saw coming.
“I’ve been saying all along, this horse was going to redeem his daddy’s name,” a beaming Smith said afterward.
5. Deserving success. An unrelenting work ethic has allowed Smith to continue to work as a jockey as he nears 60.
The jockey’s cardio-heavy workouts — running, biking, stairs — are legendary.
Asked at Del Mar two years ago how he competes against jockeys a third his age, Smith said “Look, I don’t do the running. I don’t have to be faster than (the young jockeys). I just have to be riding a horse that is.”
6. Another Derby “super-horse.” By 2018, Smith’s late-career success riding for Bob Baffert had become so prolific, the often-glib trainer had assigned him a new nickname: “Big Money Mike.”
Exactly 24 years after Holy Bull, Smith came to the Kentucky Derby on another budding “super-horse,” the Baffert-trained Justify.
This time, Smith not only got his highly-touted mount home first in the Derby, he rode Justify to wins in the Preakness Stakes and the Belmont Stakes and to the Triple Crown.
7. A Kentucky Derby record extended. If Smith and So Happy make it to the starting gate Saturday, it will be the jockey’s 29th ride in the Derby, the most ever.
That would keep him two ahead of John Velazquez, slated to ride in his 27th Kentucky Derby on Saturday aboard Further Ado.
8. A level to climb. Only 11 jockeys have ever won as many as three Kentucky Derbys.
Smith needs one more Derby victory to join that exalted group — and, obviously, the clock is ticking on his chances.
9. The chance to make history. Bill Shoemaker was 54 when he rode Ferdinand to victory in the 1986 Kentucky Derby.
A win by the 59-year-old Smith Saturday aboard So Happy would supplant Shoemaker as the oldest jockey to win the Derby.
“Records are meant to be broken,” Smith told the HBPA Kentucky last weekend at Churchill Downs. “It’s a really tough task, but I really like (So Happy) a lot.”
10. 1980s solidarity. For those of us who graduated from high school in the 1980s, there are not many current chances to root for a generational contemporary in a major American sporting event.
On Saturday in the Kentucky Derby, pulling for Mike Smith could be our last chance.
