By Neil Schmidt
The Cincinnati Enquirer

LOUISVILLE - Horse trainer Jenine Sahadi says she's glad jockey Rosemary Homeister Jr. will ride Saturday in the Kentucky Derby, but sees the accompanying attention as a sad sign.

Rosemary Homeister Jr., aboard Supah Blitz, will be only the fifth woman to ride in the Kentucky Derby. (Gary Landers photo) | ZOOM |

"The reason it's worthy of coverage is, no other woman gets a chance to ride," Sahadi says.

Homeister is only the fifth woman to ride in the Derby's 128-year history. The last woman was Hall of Fame jockey Julie Krone, in 1995. No female trainer or jockey has ever won the Derby.

"You don't want to lead people to believe it still (stinks) out here," Sahadi says. "But the bottom line is, it does. It's a matter of finding people that are OK with (women in racing). Some still have a problem with it, and I don't know that there's anything we can do about it."

INFOGRAPHIC

Women in horse racing

In one of the few major professional sports in which they compete on equal terms with men, women remain a minority: Just 110 of the 980 jockeys registered with the Jockeys' Guild (11 percent) are females. While figures aren't kept nationally for trainers, Sahadi estimates women make up 10 percent of that total. At Churchill Downs, eight of 153 trainers (5 percent) are women.

"We're still pushing the doors (of equality) open," Homeister says. "I think we always will be." (Gary Landers photo) | ZOOM |

Women trainers and jockeys lag behind their male counterparts in victories and purse earnings; sexism could be a factor. Female trainers often cite a Good Old Boys network among owners that precludes women from getting the best horses, and female jockeys insist many male trainers cling to the notion that women won't be strong enough in big races.

"There's a lot of (male) trainers that will flat not ride a girl," says Patricia Cooksey, the second-winningest female jockey.

Says Homeister, who will ride Supah Blitz in the Derby: "We're still pushing the doors (of equality) open. I think we always will be."

Women have a long history in American racing, as there are accounts of some riding thoroughbreds in races shortly after the Revolutionary War.

The official acceptance of women came slower. The first licensed woman trainer was Mary Hirsch in 1934, and Kathy Kusner had to win a court battle in 1968 to get the first riding license. Later that year, when Penny Ann Early prepared to be the first woman in a race, jockeys at Churchill Downs boycotted until she said she wouldn't ride.

"The race track has been one of the most sexist institutions, traditionally," racing author and historian Edward Hotaling says. "For years, it was kind of a macho mentality. Men, in the old days, did not think the backside was any place for women."

Julie Krone is the only woman jockey in racing's Hall of Fame. Just two women have ridden 1,900 or more career winners - Krone (3,595) and Cooksey (2,139) - compared with 275 men as of the end of 2002.

The only female jockey ranking among the top 100 in North American purse earnings last year was Canadian Chantal Sutherland, whose total of $5.9 million - when adjusted to American dollars - would rank her about 60th.

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"We still aren't getting the quality horses for the big races," says Cooksey, who at 45 is mulling retirement after breaking both legs three weeks ago in a spill.

"As far as I'm concerned, women can compete on equal terms with men. We just don't get the opportunities."

Krone, 39, is the only woman to win a Triple Crown race - the 1993 Belmont - and none has won a Breeders' Cup race.

"My accomplishments didn't change the game," Krone previously told the Enquirer. "The essence of the game is going to need more than one little warrior to accomplish that."

Diane Crump had the first professional ride for a woman in 1969, and a year later rode in the Derby.

Patti Barton, who now lives in Burlington, Ky., became a pioneer by winning 1,202 races. But her mark was better felt in the jockeys rooms, where she had numerous fistfights with men to prove herself.

"She whipped them," Cooksey says. "She didn't take any crap."

Barton's daughter, Donna, would win 1,131 races herself. But she got perhaps the most blatant snub in Derby history, in 1996 when English owner Michael Tabor refused Barton - now Donna Brothers - the mount on Honour and Glory because he refused to employ a female jockey.

D. Wayne Lukas, who trained that horse and wanted Barton aboard, describes the double standard thusly: "A female has to be so much better than a guy that she takes all the gray area away."

Says Crump: "Everything in racing is so slow to change. At smaller tracks, they're much more open to women riders. It's at the top where things are still traditional and are not equal."

Cooksey's pet peeve is the perception women aren't as strong as men.

"Usually, we're smaller, so we don't have to get in the hot box for four to five hours and starve ourselves for three days to try to get the weight," she says.

"I'd arm-wrestle that (weakened) guy any day and beat him."

Among trainers, Laura de Seroux made history last year as the first woman with a Horse of the Year, Azeri. She ranked 21st on the 2002 North American earnings list with $3.9 million. Josie Carroll ranked 79th and Sahadi 86th, the only others in the top 100.

Those who succeed in this arena are those with the thickest skin.

"It's a shame we're still looked upon differently, like we can't handle this," says Jennifer Pedersen, who won the Lane's End Stakes at Turfway Park with New York Hero, a horse that was Derby-bound before injuring a foot.

"It takes a very different kind of woman (to train). You put up with a lot of abuse. I heard it on the track even when I was 16: 'Go get me my chicken salad sandwich.' I was a woman, so my opinion didn't count."

Sahadi, 40, has won two Breeders' Cup races and set a single-season earnings record for women trainers. Yet she endured an infamous barb from rival trainer Bob Baffert three years ago, with Baffert insinuating she wasn't responsible for the training of her star horse, The Deputy.

Pedersen, a 40-year-old single mother of two, used to hide the fact she has children. "I knew it would be looked upon as, 'It couldn't be handled,' " she says. So she'd hush her kids when the phone rang, in case it was a horse owner, and take them to the track only when no one would see them.

"I'd have my daughter rocking my son in the tack room with the door closed, or strap him to my back while I was mucking stalls," she says.

The scarcity of female trainers could fit a Lukas theory:

"Girls love horses," he says. "But if you say, 'This is the job description: We want you here at 4:30 every morning; we want you to work seven days a week; don't have any children, don't even get a good dog; I want you to think about this 18 hours a day; I want you to come in blue jeans; I want you to get dirt under your fingernails; and don't get married, 'cause that'll screw it up in a heartbeat,' most women don't want to get into that situation."

The other aspect is that their successes don't necessarily influence owners' placement of horses.

"Everyone says, 'You won two Breeders' Cups,' " Sahadi says. "Well, it's been 10 years, and it hasn't done (bleep) for me. People that have that (sexist) attitude are going to keep that attitude."

Nine women have trained a Kentucky Derby starter. The top finish was second, by Shelley Riley with Casual Lies in 1992.

Homeister, 30, is a leading rider in Florida. She said she knows her appearance Saturday, albeit on a long shot, is being billed as a breakthrough. But Homeister predicts discrimination will still color her future.

"It still happens," she says. "It's a male-dominated sport.

"But I've just tried to prove myself, that I'm strong enough to do this on a daily basis. Once you get that established, people hopefully look at you as a jockey, not as a female jockey."

E-mail nschmidt@enquirer.com