Kentucky Derby Trainer Cherie DeVaux Pays Tribute to the Inspiration Behind Her Career

“I always say that talent and class are evident in horses and people very quickly,” Ingordo told Yahoo Sports. “And, you know, I’d watch Cherie and see her, and I knew her from her previous job. And I could watch, the one trainer’s name might have been on the headlines, but I saw who was doing the work. And I told her, ‘You’re too talented to be an assistant. And it’d be a waste if you don’t try it.’”

That’s something DeVaux herself attested to, and she even revealed that Ingordo told her to give it three years.

“He just told me, ‘Just give it three years. Let’s just give it three years and see if it works out.’ And I could always go and do something else,” DeVaux said, as per Wral News.

Clearly, the advice paid off, and not just at the Kentucky Derby. Since her debut as a horse racing trainer in 2018, Cherie DeVaux has had horses in more than 1800 races. Out of those, she’s won 300 while finishing either second or third 488 times. Furthermore, her career earnings crossed the $35 million mark earlier this year, partly thanks to the Derby win.

Yet, that’s a far cry from where she started. Because, for the unversed, it took DeVaux eleven months to win her first race. Unfortunately for her, it just happened to be David Ingordo’s fault.

David Ingordo apologises for Cherie DeVaux’s poor start

A well-regarded bloodstock agent and a budding horse trainer. It seemed to be a match made in heaven when David Ingordo and Cherie DeVaux got married. After all, a horse trainer depends on agents to find them the perfect horse, which in turn will boost the agent’s reputation if the animal does well. Unfortunately for Cherie DeVaux, things didn’t go according to plan.

Instead, the then 36-year-old struggled to win any of the races she participated in for the first eleven months of her career, from her debut in 2018, to a first win in March 2019. Her first win arrived when Traveling won the Maiden Claiming, but she wouldn’t win another for four months, and then the gap got shorter and shorter as everything clicked into place.

Yet, as it turns out, that eleven-month drought had nothing to do with DeVaux’s talents. Instead, it was, according to his own words, her husband and bloodstock agent, David Ingordo’s fault.

“That was 100% my fault,” Ingordo told Yahoo Sports. “We gathered up some horses of our own; we were totally self-funded. And the collection of horses I gathered were yaks, llamas, and sheep. They weren’t related to the equine species.

“I told her, ‘You should have divorced me for the effing horses I put in there.’”

Seven years later, and it’s clear the two didn’t just figure things out; they’ve become a world-class trainer and agent pair. They have even expanded their partnership into other ventures. It includes picking fillies for Belladonna Racing since 2019. This led to significant success, including consecutive graded race wins in 2023.

It’s why Cherie DeVaux never forgot who pushed her to leap in the first place, even after making Kentucky Derby history. Seven years after David Ingordo handed her a stable full of what he jokingly called “yaks and llamas,” the pair are now in the history books.

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