Flavien Prat Wins Second Straight Jockey Of The Week Title

Flavien Prat won the first Grade 1 event of the Saratoga meet with a well-timed ride aboard Excellent Truth in the Diana.

Prat earned Jockey of the Week for July 7-July 13 by the panel of racing experts for the second week in a row.

On July 13, Prat won the Diana with Excellent Truth, posting a head victory in 1:47.37.

This win marked Prat's second straight Jockey of the Week title and his 2,000th North American career win.

Prat, 32, has a goal to improve on his record-breaking 2024 Saratoga meet when he set new records for stakes wins and graded stakes wins.

Prat will be riding at Saratoga through Friday then at Monmouth Park Saturday for the mount on Goal Oriented for Hall of Fame trainer Bob Baffert in the G1 Haskell.

Prat will head to southern California to ride Nysos, also for Baffert, in the G2 San Diego Stakes at Del Mar on July 26.

Other nominees for Jockey of the Week include Paco Lopez with the most wins for the week with 10, Jose Ortiz who won the first division of the De La Rose opening day, Irad Ortiz, Jr. with a G3 win and nine wins for the week at Saratoga, and Joel Rosario with a G2 win at Saratoga.

Prat became the first jockey to win the Diana three years in a row, having won the last two editions aboard Whitebeam (GB), also trained by Brown.

Prat won the first three races on Thursday’s opening day card and a total of six races for the week.

Breaking from post position four, Excellent Truth raced in second chasing Choisya with Luis Saez as post-time favorite She Feels Pretty raced in third.

Mid way on the far turn, Excellent Truth made her move with She Feels Pretty in pursuit.

As Choisya faded, Excellent Truth and She Feels Pretty dueled down the stretch with a determined Excellent Truth just edging the four-time Grade 1 winner in the final strides to post a head victory in 1:47.37.