French-born jockey Florent Geroux stole another good race on turf when partnering Al’s Gal to victory over Suffused – who came off as the better horse on the day – in the Grade 1 E. P. Taylor Stakes at Woodbine on Sunday.
Positioned close to a steady pace, @flothejock got another effort out of the Mike Maker-trained 5-year-old to score by a nose. This was another brick in the wall of a breakout season for Geroux, who is the TRC Global Rankings #8 jockey in the freshly minted edition of our standings.
Leaving Woodbine exploits aside, we thought it might be informative to see where Geroux has made a mark against his contemporaries in the U.S. So, we cast the powerful TRC algorithm on U.S. data only in order to rank riders Stateside.
Here are the results for all races, using three years of results going back in time from the latest rankings cut-off last Sunday on all surfaces:
Overall ranking for U.S.-based riders (U.S. data only)
Rank | Dirt | Turf | Name | Rnrs | Runs | IV | tRPR | G1 wins | G2 wins | G3.wins | Pts |
1 | 1 | 2 | Javier Castellano | 285 | 495 | 1.60 | 93.71 | 33 | 33 | 42 | 1068 |
2 | 11 | 1 | Florent Geroux | 128 | 203 | 1.50 | 91.99 | 13 | 8 | 25 | 1045 |
3 | 3 | 4 | John R Velazquez | 274 | 461 | 1.29 | 92.80 | 31 | 17 | 30 | 1028 |
4 | 2 | 11 | Mike E Smith | 206 | 344 | 1.33 | 91.09 | 24 | 23 | 16 | 1020 |
5 | 7 | 7 | Jose L Ortiz | 158 | 271 | 1.17 | 91.64 | 7 | 16 | 23 | 1007 |
6 | 8 | Gary Stevens | 125 | 219 | 1.27 | 90.10 | 11 | 21 | 10 | 1007 | |
7 | 4 | 12 | Victor Espinoza | 143 | 249 | 1.31 | 89.33 | 24 | 17 | 7 | 1006 |
8 | 8 | 5 | Joel Rosario | 253 | 407 | 1.20 | 90.90 | 19 | 25 | 19 | 1005 |
9 | 13 | 3 | Irad Ortiz Jr | 200 | 342 | 1.11 | 91.57 | 13 | 16 | 22 | 1000 |
10 | 8 | 8 | Joe Bravo | 152 | 237 | 1.21 | 89.56 | 12 | 14 | 15 | 997 |
Javier Castellano is the #1 rider using only U.S. data, winning more Grade 1s, Grade 2s and Grade 3s than any of his colleagues and owning a lead of 23 points over Geroux. Castellano is a true dual-surface threat, as the numbers prove, but he is most dominant on dirt as we can see here:
Dirt-only ranking for U.S.-based riders (U.S. data only)
Rank | Turf | All | Name | Rnrs | Runs | IV | tRPR | G1 wins | G2 wins | G3.wins | Pts |
1 | 2 | 1 | Javier Castellano | 170 | 285 | 1.61 | 93.49 | 23 | 23 | 24 | 1092 |
2 | 11 | 4 | Mike E Smith | 117 | 187 | 1.39 | 91.43 | 19 | 15 | 8 | 1047 |
3 | 4 | 3 | John R Velazquez | 156 | 263 | 1.20 | 92.72 | 20 | 12 | 14 | 1028 |
4 | 12 | 7 | Victor Espinoza | 70 | 125 | 1.26 | 90.11 | 19 | 7 | 2 | 1019 |
5 | 68 | 12 | Martin Garcia | 72 | 131 | 1.28 | 88.47 | 10 | 9 | 11 | 1011 |
6 | 8 | 5 | Gary Stevens | 60 | 113 | 1.22 | 89.66 | 11 | 7 | 7 | 1010 |
7 | 7 | 5 | Jose L Ortiz | 96 | 181 | 1.17 | 90.05 | 6 | 12 | 15 | 1006 |
8 | 8 | 10 | Joe Bravo | 70 | 109 | 1.16 | 88.05 | 9 | 6 | 7 | 991 |
5 | 8 | Joel Rosario | 135 | 220 | 1.04 | 90.51 | 12 | 14 | 5 | 991 | |
10 | 10 | 11 | Rafael Bejarano | 94 | 142 | 1.07 | 89.68 | 8 | 11 | 6 | 989 |
Castellano holds an advantage of 45 points over a salty veteran in Mike Smith, with John Velazquez and Victor Espinoza some way back in third and fourth. Notice it is the same dozen-or-so riders who head the tables on dirt and overall, exhibiting the dominance of America’s traditional racing surface in determining the overall standings.
Geroux is ranked #11 on dirt and scores plenty of good winners on that surface, but there is no doubt that the lawn is his metier as the following U.S. turf-only numbers prove:
Turf-only ranking for U.S.-based riders (U.S. data only)
Rank | Dirt | All | Name | Rnrs | Runs | IV | tRPR | G1 wins | G2 wins | G3.wins | Pts |
1 | 11 | 2 | Florent Geroux | 63 | 98 | 1.63 | 89.42 | 8 | 1 | 19 | 1036 |
2 | 1 | 1 | Javier Castellano | 117 | 203 | 1.33 | 89.56 | 10 | 9 | 18 | 1008 |
3 | 13 | 9 | Irad Ortiz Jr | 75 | 130 | 1.30 | 89.47 | 7 | 7 | 12 | 1004 |
4 | 3 | 3 | John R Velazquez | 124 | 190 | 1.20 | 88.84 | 10 | 5 | 15 | 990 |
5 | 8 | 8 | Joel Rosario | 116 | 176 | 1.25 | 87.62 | 6 | 10 | 14 | 987 |
16 | 13 | Julien R Leparoux | 108 | 168 | 1.17 | 88.84 | 4 | 6 | 15 | 987 | |
7 | 7 | 5 | Jose L Ortiz | 61 | 89 | 0.99 | 88.66 | 1 | 4 | 8 | 968 |
8 | 8 | 10 | Joe Bravo | 81 | 126 | 1.05 | 87.10 | 3 | 7 | 8 | 963 |
6 | 5 | Gary Stevens | 66 | 102 | 1.13 | 85.89 | 0 | 14 | 3 | 963 | |
10 | 10 | 11 | Rafael Bejarano | 80 | 112 | 1.07 | 85.79 | 2 | 9 | 6 | 957 |
Notice that, though Castellano is still superior in the aggregate, we don’t have any doubt who deserves the #1. Geroux’s win-rate (captured by his regressed IV or ‘Impact Value’) is much superior and he has a very similar tRPR, which is ‘translated or time-decayed Racing Post Rating mean’. (If you are used to looking at sports team rankings, think of IV as winning percentage and tRPR as strength of schedule.)
TRC Global Rankings use a mathematically advanced algorithm, explained here, which is not based on arbitrary points or money won, but instead forms a hierarchy of influence between competitors within whatever data-set is being used, here just U.S. racing.
Right now, we can crown Geroux as the clear ‘Boss of the Moss’ in the U.S.