Bobby Lillis From Hot Walker to Backstretch Hero


remember Sherman telling me not to rush into race riding and that I’d know when I was ready to ride in a race,” Lillis added. By the fall of 1974, Lillis was sitting on a horse in the starting gate in his first race as a jockey. He was back at Hazel Park in a 6-fur- long race and finished third.


“What I re- by Katherine O. Rizzo It was the late 1960s when a teenaged Bobby


Lillis first stepped foot on a racetrack. “I remem- ber watching those horses coming out of the paddock and seeing the beautiful colors of the jockeys’ silks and the majestic, shiney horses and my jaw dropped,” he reminisced. “I was just in awe.” Tat was at the then Hazel Park in Michi- gan, just a few years before Lillis started an im- pressively long career within the racing industry.


Race Riding When Lillis was just 15 years old, he and his


parents headed to Detroit Race Course to meet with some trainers and jockeys. “Someone said that Bob Holthus was looking for a hot walker so we met with him and next thing I know, I’m living in a tack room at the track,” Lillis said. At the time, Lillis already had dreams of riding but had never sat on a horse. “I learned to be a


groom and then when I was 18 I went to Sugar Hill Farm in Ocala [Florida] to work for Sherman Armstrong,” he


said.


was the leading jockey of


two-year-olds


Armstrong at


the time and declared to Lillis that he would teach him to ride. “We were standing out there looking at a field of yearlings and he pointed at them and said, ‘I’m going to teach you to ride them,” Lil- lis remembered with a chuckle. “I kept telling him I’ve never ridden before and he just said, ‘you’ll fall off so many times you’ll learn to stay on.’ ” Under Armstrong’s guidance, Lillis learned


to start yearlings and eventually became an exercise rider for trainer Henry Shadowens. “I www.equiery.com | 800-244-9580


member most about that first race was how much my knees want- ed to buckle when I was done. I was ex- hausted but loved it!” Te following year


he broke his maiden on a horse named Kit- ty’s Special. Tat was March 9, 1975, at Suf- folk Downs in Massa- chusetts. By this time, Lillis was living the life of the traveling jockey, wintering in Florida and traveling up the coast to Boston, stopping along the way at various tracks during various seasons. In 1976, he had a jockey’s license at 10 different tracks on the East Coast.


Maryland’s Appeal


In 1975, Lillis met his wife Ruthanne at Mon- mouth Park in New Jersey and in the spring of 1976 they decided to settle in Maryland. Why you might ask? Because between Pimlico, Ti- monium, Laurel Park and Bowie Race Course, Maryland offered year-round racing. “I knew here in Mary- land I could just stay put,” he said. Lillis describes his


career as a jockey as “average” but said, “I was able to put two kids


through col-


Bobby Lillis’ first win as a jockey came aboard Kitty’s Special at Suffolk Downs in 1975.


lege. I also exercised [racehorses] in the mornings and was a parking attendant.” Being multi-talented and willing to work is what has kept Lil- lis in the industry for so long. When he had a bad fall that forced him to retire from race riding, “I had a chip in my hand and just


couldn’t hold a galloping horse,” he had other options to pursue within the industry. At the same time as his injury, the idea of casinos in Maryland was just getting started.


“We thought this would destroy racing because at first, no slots revenue was going to racing,” he explained. So Lillis began writing weekly to local papers in opposition to the casinos. “I became a bit political by writing letters to the [Baltimore] Sun, BloodHorse and the Washing- ton Post,” he said. “Ten slots got tagged with rac- ing incentives for purses and every- thing changed.” It was Lillis’ pas-


sion for the sport he loved that im- pressed


Richard


Meyer, then Presi- dent of the Mary- land


Bobby Lillis and Jill Kaenel working babies at Benray Farm (Westminster) in 1981.


Assistance Backstretch Advocate


In August 1998, Meyer approached Lil- lis asking if he wanted to work for MHAF. “I thought I had hit the lottery!” Lillis said with a laugh. “It was a Monday through Friday job so I didn’t have to work weekends anymore!” However, it was working and advocating for backstretch workers that really drew Lillis to the job. “I lived and worked that lifestyle and have a soft spot for backstretch workers.” Twenty-one years later, Lillis announced his


retirement as MHAF’s Executive Director ear- lier this summer. However, he’s not ready for retirement! “I’m staying on ‘til the end of the year to help them transition to someone new,” he reported. “After 50 plus years of being in the industry, I couldn’t just walk away completely!” During his time with MHAF, Lillis also took time out of his schedule to advocate for the sport as a whole, educating the general public through the Sunrise Tours during Preakness Week at Pimlico and in the Horseland tent at the Maryland State Fair. “Fran Burns approached me one year to fill a spot when Donny Miller, Sr., had to pull out due to an injury,” Lillis said of his first Sunrise Tour experience. “She’s the one that suggested instead of being a tour guide, I have a station to talk about what it’s like to be a jockey.” In true Lillis fashion, he went above and be-


yond with his tour stop. “I was able to get some extra silks, goggles and saddles and such to pass around to the kids and such,” he said. “Te people who came [to Pimlico] got a chance to actually touch the equipment and see how light the saddles are and try on some goggles.” Burns loved it and Lillis has had a tour stop ever since. “After that first year, I started asking the jock- continued...


THE EQUIERY A MARYLAND HORSE COUNCIL PUBLICATION | SEPTEMBER 2020 | 13


Horsemen’s Fund


Board of Directors.


Jim McCue


Lauren Amberman


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