Claiming Crown: Roberts and Poston Work to Overcome Odds

This fall he uprooted his life and downsized his stable to relocate to Kentucky instead of wintering in his native Texas. He’s going into Saturday’s $1.1 million Claiming Crown at Churchill Downs with a pair of longshots from his six-horse stable. So to trainer Joe Roberts, what’s another limb to step out on?

How about riding an apprentice jockey who gets a seven-pound weight allowance because she’s won only five races? That will be Amanda Poston, whose own proverbial limb was giving up a lucrative career as a software engineer four years ago at age 27 to learn how to groom, then how to gallop racehorses and finally to become a jockey.

“People may see it as taking a chance on a ‘bug’ rider,” Roberts said, referring to the nickname for apprentice jockeys. “I’m all about taking chances.”

Roberts will saddle Empire’s Best in Saturday’s $100,000 Ready’s Rocket Express and two races later Shotshell in the $100,000 Iron Horse Kent Stirling Memorial. They will be Poston’s 76th and 77th career mounts. Both trainer and rider are unfazed by long odds. Consider that Roberts bought his first horses — four for a total of $2,400 — off of Craigslist. Poston got her start on the track during COVID by emailing, as she recalls, info@canterbury.com to see if any Canterbury Park trainers needed help.

“I trust her. I know she’s a good rider,” said Roberts, whose dad, Jimmy, owns Empire’s Best. “It could be perceived as a risk, but to my mind it’s not a risk at all. When I’m looking for a rider, obviously you need talent, ability and knowledge. But a lot can be said for effort.”

The Robertses wanted a jockey to whom the Claiming Crown races meant as much as it does to them.

“They’re not just two random entries to me,” Joe Roberts said. “I put a lot of work into these horses, and Marta and the hot walkers and everybody do, too. And that’s what I expect from my rider.” (Marta Moore is Roberts’ “one and only” groom.)

From the time he was a teenager, Joe was involved with Jimmy’s construction business, ultimately having his own construction operation while also fooling around with horses. Jimmy Roberts has had racehorses since 1980, starting with quarter horses. Horses are a generations-long avocation for the family, including rodeos, barrel racing, cutting horses and roping. In fact, Joe is missing Saturday’s induction of his late maternal grandfather Joe Simmons’ induction into the Central Texas Rodeo Hall of Fame.

Of all his equine experiences, the tug of the racetrack consumed Joe Roberts the most.

“That speaks to the pull these thoroughbred horses can have on you,” he said. “It’s hard to deny once it gets in your blood. It’s hard to stay away.”

He said he got his first thoroughbred horses “off of Craigslist,” and thought he was big time when he launched his racing stable through the less-than-conventional online purchases of the quartet of runners.

“The way I looked at it, you got to step up there, show your face,” he said. “I started with horses that nobody wanted. I didn’t set the world on fire, but I made it to this point. We kept trying to pull checks in the races at night and build and build and build.”

Eight years ago, Joe Roberts gave up construction to concentrate on his racehorses. He left Texas and went to Minnesota’s Canterbury Park for the spring and summer, then back to Texas, laying up his horses before racing at Sam Houston Race Park.

“Maybe you could even call it a little bit of a midlife crisis,” he said. “I was turning 40. There were health issues. It was my own (construction) business, and I was doing the work myself. I’ve been doing it ever since I was a young kid; at that point you’re talking about 25 years. I’ve always been around horses. I found something I was very passionate about but never had the opportunity to do as a profession, and just decided to do it. Just like any business, you take a lot of hits the first couple of years.”

Off his two best years — 11 wins last year, 12 so far this year with earnings approaching $200,000 each year — Joe Roberts is embarking on a new challenge: Kentucky, with the goal of racing at Turfway Park for the winter. He winnowed his Minnesota stable of 15 down to five horses he thought would best fit in Kentucky and subsequently claimed another horse. They landed on pastoral High Pointe Farm & Training Center 30 miles from Churchill Downs.

“It felt extremely daunting moving to Minnesota,” Roberts said. “But we made it work. We kept at it, and this is just another step.”

He says it wouldn’t be possible without the support of his wife, a Realtor in their hometown outside of Austin. Natasha Roberts also runs a small farm with assistance from their 18-year-old son, Joe Mac.

“He’s just worked so hard, and I’m just proud of him,” Natasha said of her husband. “We sacrifice a lot because I live back in Texas, and he’s gone most of the time. When you’re doing what you love and you continue to excel — just do so well as he’s done in a short amount of time — you can’t let somebody you love not do what they’re passionate about.”

Natasha Roberts called being in Saturday’s Claiming Crown at Churchill Downs “surreal … two kids from Bastrop County, Texas.”

Jimmy Roberts said he’s “blown away” by participating.

“That’s hard to believe,” he said. “We started out with stuff that nobody else would have. We worked our way for seven or eight years. We were in (construction) business all those years, and we know that you build a business one brick at a time. We worked our way up to here. We’re proud of Joe.”

Amanda’s story: Software engineer turned jockey

Amanda Poston, now 31, took a big pay cut to pursue being a jockey. It all started during COVID, when she was working as a software engineer in downtown Minneapolis.

“Everything was shut down, completely, and the only thing I could do was go see my horse,” she said, referring to the pleasure-horse mare she bought after graduating from college. “I was thinking, how could I be around horses more? I had a friend who had an off-the-track thoroughbred that I got a chance to work with, and just fell in love with him.”

Poston says she emailed Canterbury Park and asked if any trainers needed help. One called, and she went out on weekends to clean stalls, walk horses and learn how to be a racetrack groom. She asked about riding racehorses, wanting to become a “breeze” rider (an exercise rider aboard for timed workouts). “Move to Arkansas,” she was told. And so she did, landing at Oaklawn Park’s year-round training center.

“The first time I got on a horse, and the first time I breezed one, that’s when I knew I had to ride races,” she said.

Poston would work at the farm from early morning until noon, then continue her software work until 9 at night. Come spring, when the horses were getting ready to return to Canterbury, she hit the delete key on her software career.

“The paycheck was great, the people were wonderful,” she said. “The job just wasn’t fulfilling the way the horses were. I went all in and left the software job to work full-time at the Canterbury meet. I never really considered going back.”

Yes, her family did think she was “a little bit” crazy. “But I always knew that if things didn’t work out on the track, that my family would help me out, and I’d have a support cushion,” she said. “And if it didn’t work out, I could always go back home.”

Poston rode her first race on Aug. 17, 2024, at Ellis Park. Her first win came Feb. 16 at Oaklawn Park. She returned to Canterbury, then came back to Kentucky to work for Marissa Short, an assistant trainer for Steve Asmussen.

“I learned just about everything I know from her,” Poston said.

This time of the year, Kentucky has arguably the toughest, deepest jockey colony in the world. It’s difficult for a lot of veteran jockeys, let alone riders with little experience, to get mounts.

“But I kept telling myself, ‘It might be a slow start, but it’s still a start,” Poston said. “And to ride with these guys out there, I learn something every single race. It’s tough, but the chance to ride with them and watch them and get advice from them makes it worth it.”

And Saturday, she’ll be in two $100,000 races alongside Irad and Jose Ortiz, Luis Saez, Tyler Gaffalione and long-time Churchill Downs stalwarts such as Corey Lanerie.

“I love the idea of the Claiming Crown to give horses in the claiming ranks a spotlight,” Poston said. “They work just as hard as the Grade 1 winners. I’m so excited to be a part of it. And Churchill gives it a really cool spotlight.”

She concedes she “sort of” misses the money she made in her past life.

“The paychecks were a lot bigger and very consistent, which is nice,” Poston said. “But it’s not worth trading all of this I have in my life now. There’s just something about being around horses and getting on them. Even just being in a barn around people who love horses.”

The Claiming Crown serves as a championship-style event to put the spotlight on the everyday horses that fill out racing programs across the country. The 27th Claiming Crown, at Churchill Downs Saturday for the third time in four years, features eight races worth a total of $1.1 million, plus another $130,000 in purse supplements for registered Kentucky-breds. Saturday’s card is one of the year’s best betting opportunities, with seven of the Claiming Crown races attracting a capacity or overflow field, including three 14-horse fields. The fewest entries are 10 in the $100,000 Ready’s Rocket Express. The card also includes the $300,000, Grade 3 Chilukki Stakes for fillies and mares. TwinSpires is staging a National Horseplayers Championship qualifier tournament on the 11-race Claiming Crown card, with a $500 buy-in for the online, live-money competition.

The Claiming Crown was launched in 1999 by the National HBPA and Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association. The 2025 Claiming Crown is staged in conjunction with Churchill Downs and the Kentucky HBPA.

VIDEO: Meet trainer Joe Roberts, who has two of his six horses in the Claiming Crown

VIDEO: Meet jockey Amanda Poston and horse owner Jimmy Roberts

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