I was born into the horse racing industry. My mother has been a top quality groom for over 28 years. One of the great horses she groomed was "Ingot's Ruler", who captured Grass Horse of the Louisiana Downs meet and was a multiple stakes winner.

My father has been a top quality groom for over 15 years. He groomed the filly "Fly Jane Fly" when she captured her first stakes win of $100,000.00. After my father left that stable to pursue a more challenging stable of horses to rub, the filly never won another stakes race. My father has an exceptional record with rubbing crippled horses.

My grandfather is "Joe LaMonte", who was a jockey for more than 20 years and won more than 1700 races in his career. Joe LaMonte had been a leading rider seven times and was never out of the top ten in the rider standings. He rode with the legendary "Eddie Arcaro" and learned a lot from him. Eddie was said to be my grandfather's mentor. He retired from riding races 21 years later. He then pursued his career as a trainer and trained all over the United States. Twenty years later he became my agent before retiring from the racing industry due to illness.

I take pride in my family and I owe much of the education I received in the Thoroughbred Racing Industry and the Thoroughbred racehorse to my family.

At the age of four I knew that I wanted to become a jockey. I couldn't imagine doing anything else. When I was eight years old I walked hots at the track and did odd and end jobs, all the while learning from my family. I galloped my first race horse at Wrap Around Training Center when I was twelve years old. I would get up at 4:30 a.m. and head for the training center and gallop some easy horses that trainers had allowed me to learn on. After I finished morning galloping I would go to school, and when school let out I headed straight to the track. I loved watching the feature race, which was usually a stakes race or a high dollar allowance race. I knew who every big horse was at the track, including their trainers.

I would look at the horses in the same way that I do today; for the most part I would look at the horses with the well-groomed coats and brilliant coat color. I would look at their conformation and muscle structure along with the type of equipment they wore. I would watch their movement and personalities and how they would look walking around the paddock. If the horse was having a fit and acting like a lunatic I would count him out. Something was wrong. The relaxed and well-groomed horses stood out from the rest in my mind. I had the knack for studying a horse and knowing their abilities by their outer appearance. Then, and only then, would I open my program and mark what horses I wanted to wager on.

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