Eddie Maple: Secretariat's Jockey

One of the jockeys that rode Secretariat lived in Carroll County. Eddie Maple is a very famous jockey and got inducted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame. Eddie Maple won his first race when he was 17 years old. He began his career in Ohio and West Virginia and moved on to New Jersey before establishing himself in New York in 1971.

Eddie Maple won the Belmont Stakes twice, rode to three upset victories of Forego on different horses and piloted Secretariat to victory in the last race of that champion’s career. In statistics since 1976, he had 217 graded stakes winners and 363 wins in all stakes. He led jockey standings for meetings at Saratoga and Aqueduct.Maple rode many horses for Woody Stephens, including Horse of the Year Conquistador Cielo, on whom he scored in one of the three Metropolitan Handicaps the rider won. Eddie was riding Secretariat for his victory in the 1973 Canadian International

In addition to multiple victories in the Belmont, Suburban, and Met Mile, Maple won the Saranac Handicap seven times, the Hempstead (now the Ogden Phipps) and the Saratoga Special five times each, the Dwyer, Carter and Remsen four times each and the Futurity, Super Derby, Breeders’ Futurity, Manhattan and Delaware Handicap three times each.

Maple was voted the George Woolf Memorial Jockey Award for 1995 and the Mike Venezia Memorial Award in 1998. Eddie Maple was inducted into the National Museum of Racing’s Hall of Fame in 2009.

This is very important to me because we came from the same small town and he Eddie made a name for himself. It makes me think that I can do big things like him even though we came from a small town.