Jen Roytz is the executive director of the Retired Racehorse Project (RRP), which aims to increase the demand for and value of Thoroughbreds as competition and riding horses after their racing days are done. The organization’s largest annual event, the Thoroughbred Makeover and National Symposium, presented by Thoroughbred Charities of America (TCA), is usually held in the fall, but it has been postponed until 2021 due to the current pandemic.
Prior to her current role, Roytz, 39, was the marketing and communications director at Three Chimneys Farm. A longtime advocate for the Thoroughbred, Roytz, who is based in Lexington, Kentucky, also serves on numerous boards, including the advisory board for the Thoroughbred Aftercare Alliance and the Kentucky Horse Council.
Who do you believe is the most important figure in the history of racing around the world?
I wish I was smart enough to know the answer to this. Pari-mutuel wagering is arguably the most significant driver of our industry’s economic viability and sustainability, and since Google tells me Joseph Oller designed the first pari-mutuel wagering system in the 1860s in France, I will put $2 to win on Joseph Oller as the most important figure in the history of racing around the world.
Which is your favorite venue and race?
I love different tracks for different reasons. It’s so hard to choose one. Delaware Park has such a pretty paddock and just such a family-friendly atmosphere throughout its grounds. I love the backside at Saratoga — and the frontside as well — because it’s so park-like and serene. What a wonderful place for horses to train! Keeneland lives up to its slogan of ‘Racing as it was meant to be’. It's one of the few tracks that truly makes every race day feel special. I literally could list ten more for various reasons, but I won’t bore you further.
Funny, though, my favorite race isn’t at any of those venues. It’s the [G1] Turf Classic, the race prior to the Kentucky Derby on the first Saturday in May. I love turf racing, and so often you see older well-known horses in that race. So, it’s usually a field full of class. (See the video below for Wise Dan’s victory in the race in 2013.)
What is your fondest memory in racing?
My father taking me to Thistledown [in Ohio] on a Saturday morning when I was 14 or 15 to watch horses train because he had a horse-crazy daughter who loved watching racing on TV. It was magical, and it truly changed the trajectory of my life. A trainer, Joe Shuman, saw us standing by the rail, and he asked one of his riders to stop and let me pet his horse. Then Joe invited us back to his barn for a tour after training hours.
He told my dad if I ever wanted to come back up on a weekend morning, he’d find things for me to do around the barn. With that, for the next four years, I spent nearly every morning I wasn’t in school at Joe’s shedrow cleaning stalls, walking hots, doing up legs etc, waking my dad – who is a saint — up at 4 am to drive me until I was old enough to drive myself.
By the time I graduated from high school, I knew how to gallop, and that helped me pay for college. From then on, I’ve worked in or around the racing industry. As the old saying goes, “It's the little things that make a big difference.”
What do you see as the biggest challenge racing faces today?
Lack of national oversight. You have state racing jurisdictions around the country each doing their own thing. Medication thresholds are different from state to state, as are raceday Lasix protocols, claiming rules, aftercare/anti-slaughter protocols, owner/trainer licensing, and the list goes on.
As someone with a background in marketing and PR, I feel strongly that our industry’s lack of national oversight is a key contributor to our public perception issue, which, in my opinion, is quite significant these days. As we’ve seen several times over the past few years, when a crisis occurs, the Thoroughbred industry does not have a unified voice or key spokesperson.
This not only severely hampers our efforts to communicate to the mainstream public, but it also makes it incredibly confusing for non-racing media to navigate covering our sport and industry.
If you could change one thing in racing, what would it be?
A solution to the challenge of Question #4 — develop a structure for national oversight in order to create uniformity in and a unified voice for our sport.