Jaime Mejia
 

Where'd trainer Jaime Mejia go from the Gulfstream entries this week? Looks like a relative has taken over ownership & a new trainer involved. His horses fill up the entry box a lot, often way over their head, but I feel like it's an entertaining part of the GP meet (kind of the way the Rose family would spring the big upset not all that long ago either), anyone know the reason for the departure?

Personally, I won't miss him. His horses do fill up the entry box, but many of them are horses that have been running on 10 days' rest for months at a time.

But here's some good news. I posted here a while back about one such Mejia horse, Gladiator King, a sprinter. Mejia ran the crap out of him in late 2018 through mid-2019, including a couple of graded routes (Holy Bull and FOY) that the horse clearly had no business in. After his last race in June, he fell off the radar completely. But I read the other day that on Jan. 2 Gladiator King won the 6f G3 Dubawi Stakes under a different trainer, his first race back since June 1 of last year.

P.S. - Just noticed he has a horse (Juan Boly) running today in R1 at Gulfstream.

I saw that in the post parade today & thought oops, should've said starting tomorrow it appears all his stock have moved over.



Gladiator King's a nice animal. Was wondering if maybe the sheikh paid a pretty enough penny to acquire him to let Mejia walk away...total guesswork, but that's why I'm curious as to what the actual story is.

I've been tracking him for quite a spell now, floored that anyone could have such a run of low success rate with a barn full of sire line who's who horses. It's become a thing that his horse is tossed automatically from consideration. But that first race on NYDay the card something about race shape made that 9 horse grab me, so I played it, expecting same result as usual. Lo and behold that horse ran balls out and won basically wire to wire for $51.00. Great way to start the day.
I don't know if there is ANY trainer going that more exemplifies the ideal of lose a lot but win big when you win.

Uriah St. Lewis and Randi Persaud: "Hold my beer"

Unfortunately found out that trainer Jaime Mejia passed away the other day. I wonder now if the absence earlier this year was health related.

https://www.bloodhorse.com/horse-rac...gladiator-king