Deshawn L. Parker

Deshawn Parker
Deshawn Parker
Occupation	Jockey
Born	January 8, 1971; Cincinnati, Ohio
Career wins	5,419[1]
Major racing wins
	selected stakes wins:; Autumn Leaves Stakes (2005); Labor Day Stakes (2007); Mountaineer Mile Stakes (2007, 2008, 2013); Best of Ohio Juvenile Stakes (2008); Hancock County Handicap (2008, 2009); Mountaineer Fall Stakes (2008, 2009); Panhandle Handicap (2008); Senator Robert C. Byrd Memorial Handicap (2011); John W. Galbreath Stakes (2012); Rose DeBartolo Memorial Stakes (2012); Miss Ohio Stakes (2012); Hoover Stakes (2012); Mountaineer Juvenile Fillies Stakes (2012); Cleveland Kindergarten Stakes (2012); Firecracker Stakes (2012); Royal North Stakes (2013); Tom Ridge Stakes (2014); West Virginia Governor's Stakes (2015); Green Carpet Stakes (2015); Howard B. Noonan Stakes (2015); Sam Houston Sprint Cup Stakes (2015, 2016); San Jacinto Stakes (2016); Indiana Futurity (2017); Crown Ambassador Stakes (2017); Hillsdale Stakes (2017); Florence Henderson Stakes (2017); Yellow Rose Stakes (2017); Spirit of Texas Stakes (2017); San Jacinto Turf Stakes (2017)
Racing awards
	United States Champion Jockey by wins (2010, 2011)
Honors
	Sam Houston Race Park Champion Jockey (2015)
Significant horses
	Bernie Blue, La Chica Rica, Marina's Legacy, Texas Chrome

Deshawn L. Parker (born January 8, 1971 in Cincinnati, Ohio) is a Thoroughbred horse racing jockey who is a two-time United States Champion. In addition, on May 2, 2016 he became only the thirty-second jockey in the history of North American Thoroughbred racing to win 5,000 races.^[2]

Career

Deshawn Parker began his professional riding career in 1988. At 5 ft 11 in (1.80 m), he is one of the tallest jockeys in racing. In his first five years riding from 1988 through 1992, Deshawn Parker won just 60 races in total. The next year he won 72, more than the previous five combined and continued to improve. In 2002 he broke into the 200 level and in 2008 reached 300 plus wins for the first time and would accomplish that for five straight years including 2011 when he attained 400 wins.^[3]

In 2010, Deshawn Parker won 377 races to earn his first national title. It marked the first time an African-American had done so in the sport since James "Soup" Perkins one hundred and fifteen years earlier in 1895. Parker won his second national title in 2011 with 400 wins. He is also the winningest African-American in history. On May 6, 2012 Parker won six races on a single racecard at Mountaineer Racetrack in New Cumberland, West Virginia where he had made his home base for many years and where he is the all-time leading jockey in wins.^[4] ^[5] In 2012, he was honored by the Jockeys' Guild with its Laffit Pincay Jr. Award and twice has been a finalist for the George Woolf Memorial Jockey Award.^[6]

External links

Voice of America radio September 30, 2010 program 'Winning Ponies', Deshawn Parker interview by host John Engelhardt
Rachel McLaughlin interview titled "Getting to know Jockey Deshawn Parker" published April 21, 2017

References

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[1] Equibase statistics through June 23, 2018

[2] Daily Racing Form May 2, 2016 article titled "Deshawn Parker wins his 5,000th race"

[3] Equibase statistics for Deshawn L. Parker through June 23, 2018

[4] Bloodhorse.com May 7, 2012

[5] August 21, 2015 article titled "Rare Upset for Jockey Parker at Mountaineer"

[6] January 26, 2015 Jockeys' Guild