Mike Brunker Horse racing editor • Profile • E-mail

BALTIMORE - “Cowboy” Jack Kaenel’s brilliant future extended as far as he could see beneath the brim of his outsized white Stetson as he perched atop Aloma's Ruler on May 15, 1982, in the Pimlico winner's circle.

At 16, Kaenel had just become the youngest jockey ever to win the Preakness Stakes by holding off legendary jockey Bill Shoemaker and 1-2 favorite Linkage through the stretch.

But 25 years later, he is about as far from horse racing’s highest rungs as you can get. He is flat broke and needs a comeback to pay a mountain of medical bills from recent emergency brain surgery.

“I’m going to be paying on it for a while,” Kaenel said this week, adding that he doesn’t know how much the 12-day hospital stay will cost. “… I don’t imagine it’s going to be too cheap.”

The financial crisis for the uninsured 41-year old is the result of a seizure and cracked skull that he suffered in early April. It completes what has been a steady downward spiral in the fortunes of a jockey described by longtime friend and rival Ron Warren Jr. as “able to do anything you can do on the back of a horse.”

Though he has ridden 2,046 winners from 15,270 races in his career, Kaenel never again rode in a Triple Crown race after winning his remarkable debut on the national stage. He rode some nice horses — such as Eclipse Award winning turf mare Brown Bess and record-smashing sprinter Zany Tactics — but those were not rides on racing’s Broadway stage, where he seemed so at home in the early years.

Some of his troubles have been of his own making. The “Cowboy” has battled alcoholism over the years and has burned more bridges in his nomadic wanderings through racing’s landscape than most people have ever crossed.

Pimlico racetrack Jack Kaenel sits aboard Aloma's Ruler in the winner's circle on May 15, 1982, after winning the Preakness Stakes.

But he also suffered injuries and waged a battle against weight, a ruthless foe for a jockey who is tall for his sport at 5-feet, 7-inches.

The tragic side of Kaenel’s story, however, doesn’t begin to tell the tale of this thoroughbred jockey cut from the old cloth.

Kaenel also has more friends and admirers than most who have played a game that is cutthroat and unforgiving.

His ex-wife, Debbie Crough, says he possesses a horse whisperer’s sense of what a horse needed.

“He taught me that if a horse is running as fast as it can, that’s all you’re going to get from them,” said Crough, a former jockey and daughter of thoroughbred trainers J.C. and Barbara Williams. “If a horse was agitated, he wouldn’t try to overpower them. He was in tune with them. … And as far as just balance and agility on a horse, he was just outstanding.”

Those who know him best talk as much about his good heart and love of life as about the tremendous talent that flowered at the Preakness.

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“He likes to have a good time and enjoy life,” said Warren, who rode against Kaenel in the 1980s and '90s. “He’s good natured, and he’s been a good friend forever.”

Kaenel’s son, Kyle, who at 19 is following in his boot prints as a jockey, describes his dad as an open book.

“He’s kind of his own man,” Kyle said. “He’s very outgoing and he’s not one to hold anything back, whether it’s a happy comment or something serious. It’s a great quality … sometimes.”

Kaenel is also known for his sense of humor and hilarious stunts he has engineered.

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There was the time he took a Brahma bull through the hills surrounding Pleasanton, Calif., during the two-week fair racing meet, then rode him into a saloon in town and tied him to the bar while he quenched his thirst.

“The owner was a racetracker, so he didn’t care,” Kaenel said.

Then there were the midnight match races in the nude, riding bareback with the promise of a full-body strawberry to any rider who fell.

It is no accident that many of Kaenel’s storied exploits involve booze, for it has been a part of his fast-paced lifestyle even before his Preakness victory, Crough said.

“It goes with the lifestyle, the dinners where you go to celebrate,” she said. “Even if you’re 16 or 17 years old, someone’s going to hand you a beer.”

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