By Dick Jerardi
Jacqueline (Jackie) Davis had one word to describe her 2025 Parx meeting: “aggravating.”
And no wonder. After Tuesday’s racing, she had taken 41 mounts with 8 seconds, 4 thirds and no wins. It’s not that the jockey, who began riding in 2008, is not without talent. Her career where she has been in the top 10 at so many meetings proves that. So do her 942 wins.
It is called horse racing for a reason. Jockeys can’t make slow horses run fast. And Davis, who was a regular at Parx in 2014 and 2015 when she finished 10th (60 wins) and 13th (45 wins) respectively in the standings, has long since proved when she is on one of the fastest horses, she knows her way to the winner’s circle.
“When I finish second, I go back; I watch the replays,” she said in the paddock before taking her lone mount Tuesday. “As long as I’m doing everything absolutely right and I have no excuse, it’s still aggravating because we all want to win. But as long as I do my job properly and put the horse in the right position, I’ve got no complaints.”
Jackie is from the First Family of American jockeys. Her father Robbie (3,382 wins) rode the New York/Florida circuit and won multiple Grade I races in the 1980s and 1990s. Her brother Dylan (1,518 wins) had a breakout 2024 in New York with 10 graded stakes wins and, over the previous three years, has 566 wins and mount earnings of more than $40 million. Sister Katie, who also rides in New York, has 331 career wins. Add it all up and the Davis family has 6,173 wins among them.
“I am so proud of my brother and sister and my dad for the career he’s had,” Jackie said. “Both Katie and Dylan, they’re both growing as riders and moving up in the industry. I’m just blessed and proud.”
Brother and sisters have ridden in the same race many times.
“We’re so competitive and it doesn’t matter where we finish in a race as long as we beat each other,” Jackie said.
Davis is going to head back to Finger Lakes later this spring where she will be in demand and on live horses. The last four years, she finished seventh (52 wins), fifth (47 wins), third (64 wins) and eighth (36 wins) in the upstate New York track standings. She finished in the top 10 at Penn National in 2019.
“I love to go to new places and new race tracks to ride new surfaces because I think it makes me a better rider,” Jackie said.
She enjoyed her time at Parx a decade ago and is enjoying it now despite the aggravation of coming so close so often without actually getting there.
“I’ve always liked the camaraderie, I like how everybody feels like they’re happy to be here for the most part,” Jackie said.
She still enjoys the game as much as when she began riding in 2008.
“I’m much more experienced now so there are a lot of different emotions involved,” Davis said. “But I actually feel like the first year I was riding. I feel that excited about racing and horses and the people.”
Her main goal at the moment is to get to 1,000 wins. She needs 58 from now until the end of the year.
“I expect to do that this year so that’s my most realistic goal,” Jackie said.
She would love to get the chances on top horses that her brother is now getting.
“I like to have big dreams,” Jackie said. “I’ve ridden in stakes races, I’ve ridden in a couple of graded stakes, I’ve never won them. My goal is to win one of them, obviously. But I like to have smaller goals. You can’t go from A to C.”
Jackie said she will travel anywhere for a good horse or an opportunity. Growing up when her father was riding, her family spent part of the year in Florida, most in New York.
Interestingly, Robbie pushed Jackie “very hard not to be a jockey. He saw how hard it was for women in the industry, how hard it was for men in the industry to make it.”
Robbie suggested it was 99-1 against Jackie who “blames” her desire to become a jockey on her dad because “he made us all daredevils.”
It’s a family, Jackie said, of “natural athletes.”
Her father, she said, was hard on her at the beginning.
“I took it to heart and did everything he said,” Jackie said.
And now, Jackie Davis is making a career out of what can be an unforgiving profession. She is after 1,000 and sees no reason why she can’t ride for at least another 10 years and perhaps get to 2,000 wins someday.
