The photo is a bit faded, just like the memory. It was 1988 after all, on a dark, cold February afternoon in Queens, New York. There weren’t cell phones back then. Magazines were printed with camera-ready, typeset papers glued to cardboard. The racetrack was a happening place to be, on the backstretch or in the stands.
I had made my way down to the area around Aqueduct racetrack, nestled between South Ozone Park and Jamaica neighbourhoods, to meet my friends from Kinghaven Farms. Assistant trainer Mike Keogh had a small string of horses stabled at Belmont to race at Aqueduct that winter, while Kinghaven’s main trainer, Roger Attfield, had headed off to the south with the bulk of the barn.
Kinghaven was on the cusp of incredible years with incredible horses. With Approval, who would become the first Triple Crown winner in two years in 1989, had just turned two.
Mike’s big horse in his New York string was Triple Wow, a Coastal mare bred by Bob Anderson who had won stakes races at three and four. ‘Wow-Burger’ had run 27 times in the previous two seasons in fact, traveling to Detroit, Thistledown, Churchill, Fairmount Park, and others. The weekend I arrived, Triple Wow was entered in the $110,200 Next Move Handicap. Richard Migliore was scheduled to ride again as he had just piloted her to a second place finish in the Rare Treat Handicap in January.
Mike was friends with Richard and we all spent an evening with the rider and his wife Carmela. I had been to Aqueduct before, for the 1985 Breeders’ Cup races. I recall sub-zero temperatures, sketchy-looking water from the motel, and my favourite horse Cozzene winning the Mile.
But this was a bigger trip for me since I was working for Kinghaven at Woodbine and was part of the family. Triple Wow was expected to be a strong factor and she went out and won over the muddy track.
In the winner’s circle was Mike, Andrea Arsenault, who ran Triple Wow, exercise riders Kim Pankhurst and Glen Buttigieg, grooms Chris Rubio, Karl Lagerboard and Lance Giliforte. It was a fabulous day.
Aqueduct will run its last races on my birthday, June 28. While it was not my favourite track by any means, and not a track I visited frequently, it had its place in racing lore, it had its own feel, and it has provided memories for thousands of people world-wide. Even a university student from Ontario.
From NYRA Media:
Aqueduct Racetrack has hosted countless horsemen in its 132-year history, and an even larger number of horses to grace its surfaces. As the Big A approaches its finish line on June 28, the New York Racing Association, Inc. (NYRA) press office checked in with a handful of the dedicated horsemen and women that have woven themselves into Aqueduct’s story to reflect on their memories at the South Ozone Park oval.
Richard Migliore made 2,238 trips to the winner’s circle at Aqueduct Racetrack during his 31-year career as a jockey, more than any rider in the track’s storied history.
“Aqueduct was the beginning of everything for me. I went there and knew right away what I wanted to do with the rest of my life,” said Migliore, a 10-time leading rider at the track. “I grew up eight miles away and will never forget going there with my father as a kid. All you’d hear on the train ride was people talking about the daily double at Aqueduct. I fell in love with the place. I fell in love with the sport there – and I’ve been in love with the game ever since.”
Grade 1-winning jockey Nick Santagata made a lasting impact at Aqueduct, where he won hundreds of races as a rider before retiring and becoming a valet at NYRA’s racetracks.
Santagata, a native of Brooklyn, attended a riding school in his youth in Jamaica Queens, and rode his first race in 1977. He went on to land his first trip to the winner’s circle on February 5, 1978 aboard Rapid Invader at Keystone Race Track, and in 1986, he captured the Aqueduct winter meet riding title with 62 wins.
“It’s going to be sad to see it go, but we’ve got a new track over there at Belmont that’s state-of-the-art with modern everything, so hopefully we can capitalize on that and we’ll be one of the best circuits in America,” he said.
Among his wins at the Big A were a Grade 1 triumph atop the Jack Ludwig-trained Another Reef in the 1985 Vosburgh, as well as additional graded scores in the 1988 Grade 3 Rare Treat Handicap aboard With a Twist, the 1989 Grade 2 Distaff Handicap on Avie’s Gal, the second division of the 1986 Grade 2 Bay Shore on Buck Aly and the 1991 Grade 3 Bold Ruler with Rousing Past.
“I’ve been here a long time as a hotwalker, an exercise rider, a jockey, a valet,” said Santagata, who continued to gallop horses in the mornings until 2024. “It’s a place that made a lot of careers – mine especially – and there’s a lot of places that didn’t have winter racing and we did here. We would get our exposure here. My only Grade 1 came in the Vosburgh, and there’s so many good memories and people here. It’s hard to pinpoint one.”
NYRA’s leading trainer in two of the last three years, Linda Rice has been a top presence at Aqueduct for more than three decades, but took it to the next level since 2023, winning 12 of the last 17 meet training titles here. Her 1,215 wins as of June 20 make her the leading trainer by wins at the Big A, according to statistics provided by Equibase dating to 1976.
“Aqueduct is more hardcore, passionate racing fans – there’s no tourists, really, and it’s just people who follow the game, understand it, and they’ll yell at you when you lose and cheer for you when you win,” Rice said, with a laugh. “It’s a hardcore crowd, but we enjoy it.”
Rice has claimed victory in some of Aqueduct’s most historic events, winning four editions of the Grade 3 Distaff Handicap [La Verdad, 2014-15 as a Grade 2; Holiday Disguise, 2018; and Mommasgottarun, 2023]; the Grade 2 Remsen in 1996 with The Silver Move; the 2020 Grade 3 Withers with Max Player; the Grade 3 Excelsior in 2016 with Kid Cruz and as a listed event in 2026 with Yo Daddy; and the 2023 Grade 3 Bay Shore with Joey Freshwater.
“I’m going to miss Aqueduct and I’ve spent a lot of years racing here,” Rice said. “I’ve built my career in New York, and a big part of that has been Aqueduct. As a young trainer, I was struggling and climbing the ladder, and then won several titles here. I remember in 1996 I won the Remsen with The Silver Move, and that was very memorable.”
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