Hall of Fame jockey Bobby Ussery, a Kentucky Derby (G1) winner who was ranked fifth in career earnings when he retired in 1974, has died in South Florida, according to a Nov. 17 Gulfstream Park release.
Ussery, a native of Vian, Okla., was 88.
Ussery won the 1967 Kentucky Derby aboard 30-1 longshot Proud Clarion when they rallied from ninth early to catch front-running Barbs Delight in the stretch to post a one-length victory. Favored Damascus. with Bill Shoemaker up, would finish third followed by Reason to Hail. It was a mount Ussery picked up after his original Derby mount, Reflected Glory, couldn't make the race because of sore shins. He won the 1960 Preakness Stakes with Florida Derby winner Bally Ache.
Sports Illustrated called Ussery's ride aboard Proud Clarion "one of the best in Derby history."
Ussery thought he might have a good weekend in Louisville.
"I might have won it with Bally Ache in 1960, but we finished second," he said. "Then I thought I'd win it this year with Reflected Glory. When that didn't work out, I still figured—just a hunch, I guess—that it was my year, no matter what horse I rode. I had a real hunch."
Ussery's riding career started with a win aboard his first mount, Reticule, in the 1951 Thanksgiving Day Handicap at Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots. Ussery was a top rider in Florida throughout the 1950s, then moved to New York, where in 1959 he rode a record 215 winners. In 1960 Ussery was the top North American rider in stakes purses won.
In that 1960 season he rode juvenile champion male Hail to Reason and won the Preakness, Flamingo Stakes, and Florida Derby on the aforementioned Bally Ache. A few years later he would cross the finish line first in the 1968 Derby, but his mount, Dancer's Image, was later disqualified—denying Ussery a second straight win in the Louisville, Ky., classic.
Other notable wins for Ussery came in the Alabama, Travers, Hopeful, Mother Goose, Canadian International, and Queen's Plate stakes, as well as the Wood Memorial Stakes twice and the Whitney Handicap. Ussery joined Queen Elizabeth II in the Woodbine winner's circle after his victory aboard New Providence in the 1959 Queen's Plate.
The 10th rider to surpass 3,000 career wins, Ussery ranked among the top 10 North American riders in earnings nine times during his career and was among the top 10 in wins six times.
Ussery was known for his unorthodox style of riding high in the saddle, almost standing up in the stirrups. When he was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1980, he said this style allowed him to see the competition and he didn't mind how it looked.
"It may not be pretty," Ussery said. "But I figure riding is no beauty contest. I'm comfortable and it's getting results. Why change? I don't worry how I look as long as I get results."
He would see his way to the winner's circles of many of North America's great races.
Arrangements are pending. Expressions of sympathy may be made in Ussery's memory to the Permanently Disabled Jockeys Fund at pdjf.org.
