Ramon Moya gallops to victory aboard Bel Pensiero. (EQUI-PHOTO)
Jockey Ramon Moya savoring first stakes win in 10 years after winning even bigger race against heroin addiction.
Tom Luicci/Monmouth Park
OCEANPORT, N.J. – The emotion in the winner’s circle after Ramon Moya, Jr. won Sunday’s Pinot Grigio Handicap at Monmouth Park aboard Bel Pensiero – and the absence of any dry eyes there – was 10 years in the making for the 36-year-old jockey.
That’s how long it had been between stakes winners for Moya, who last won a stakes race on Sept. 9, 2014, when he captured the Charles Hesse III Handicap.
But it’s what happened during that 10-year gap that was the reason that Sunday’s victory was so special.
“It was very emotional,” said Moya, who is listed to ride one horse on Friday’s opening night, all-turf card during the Monmouth-at-Meadowlands meet. “To end the Monmouth Park meet with my first stakes win since 2014 . . . it’s hard to put into words what it meant. You’re just overcome with emotion.”
Moya, who hails from Newark, had been gripped in the throes of heroin addiction from 2016 to 2019, when he did not ride at all in a career that began in 2009. He is coming up on five years of being sober and clean.
“Unless you’ve been through it, it’s hard to explain what it was like,” he said. “It was a lot of misery. You wake up every day and you can’t believe that this is what your life has become, being addicted to heroin.
“I was in and out of rehab, in and out of detox, couch surfing, homeless for a while and in and out of jail a few times. It’s something you don’t think your life would ever become.”
Though his family tried to help, Moya rejected their offers, saying “I didn’t want their help at the time.”
He finally decided on his own to get the help he needed.
“You have to hit rock bottom,” said Moya, who has ridden 13 winners this year after having 23 a year ago. Overall, he has 223 career wins. “There’s a saying with addiction that sometimes you haven’t been through enough pain yet. I see it with people I try to help get clean when they go back. I always say they haven’t had enough pain yet.
“I finally had enough pain. I was tired of it. So, I went to get the help I needed and I stuck with it this time.”
Moya said he found a sober home in nearby Long Branch in 2020 in the hope that when Monmouth Park opened for the summer, he would get work on the backstretch. It happened slowly, with Moya eventually meeting trainer Anthony Margotta, a recovering heroin addict as well.
“I reached out to Anthony when I was clean, knowing his story,” he said. “That’s how we became friends.
Margotta trains Bel Pensiero and has used Moya on his horses extensively the past two years.
But it took a while for trainers to trust and believe, according to Moya.
“That was the hardest part, getting people to give me a chance again,” he said. “It was very tough for some trainers to put me on horses knowing my story. It took years to have any type of business again. You can talk about being sober and clean, but people want you to show them. It took a while, but I have been able to do that and now I am getting opportunities that other jockeys get.”
Just last week, Moya won races at Parx, Delaware Park and Monmouth Park. He is listed to ride two horses on Saturday during the Monmouth-at-Meadowlands meet and then four on Monday at Parx.
“It was a tough summer, to be honest,” he said. “I had some momentum in January, and I thought that would carry over to Monmouth Park. But it didn’t work out.”
At least it didn’t until the final day of the Monmouth Park meet.
“Winning that stakes race is a memory I will keep for the rest of my life,” he said.
