The best phone call Alex Solis received last week was from retired jockey Fernando Toro on Friday morning. Toro, who used to ride regularly for Richard Mandella, was around the trainer's barn when the decision was made to use Solis as Gary Stevens' replacement aboard Dare And Go in the $500,000 Strub Stakes.
"I was real happy," Solis said. "I was praying to God that I'd get the chance to ride that horse."
While Stevens rode two winners Sunday in Hong Kong, the start of a four-month commitment to ride there, Solis rode Dare And Go to a wire-to-wire 1 1/4-length victory in the Strub before 45,597 at Santa Anita.
The other jockeys who petitioned Mandella for the mount--starting with Hall of Famers Chris McCarron and Laffit Pincay and including Chris Antley and Corey Black--could only look on with envy while Solis celebrated a $27,500 payday, which was a jockey's standard 10% share.
