Juan Hernandez rides to Santa Anita title with stakes double

ARCADIA — Juan Hernandez restored order to the Santa Anita jockey standings by clinching the fall-meet riding title on a day he won two stakes.

Hernandez rode the Graham Motion-trained 3-year-old Test Score (who paid $3.20) to victory in the $200,000, Grade II Twilight Derby and rode Privman ($3.80) to the Bob Baffert-trained 3-year-old’s first stakes victory in the $85,000 Tokyo City Cup against older horses Saturday.

Going into Sunday’s closing card at the month-long Santa Anita fall meet, Hernandez has a 26-18 lead in wins over Umberto Rispoli, who has mounts in only four races. Hernandez’s title is his third in a row at the fall meet, ninth overall and eighth in Santa Anita’s past nine Classic, Hollywood and autumn meets. His reign was interrupted when he finished second to Antonio Fresu at the Hollywood Meet this spring.

“I’m really happy for another one,” Hernandez said, giving credit to his agent, Craig O’Bryan, and thanks to trainers and owners.

Test Score, shipped in from the East Coast, rallied wide to beat Maaz by 1½ lengths in a 1⅛-mile turf race. Privman, named for former Los Angeles Daily News and Daily Racing Form racing writer Jay Privman, used a late burst to beat front-runner Pony Express by three-quarters of a length at a mile.

Baffert’s win with Privman cut leading trainer Phil D’Amato’s lead to 12-11 going into Sunday, where Baffert entered one horse and D’Amato has horses in three races.

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