Five months is a long time to sit with broken bones and the memory of a stretcher. On January 24, Umberto Rispoli was carried off the Gulfstream Park turf course after Unconquerable Keen stumbled and sent him over his left shoulder in the Gulfstream Park Turf Sprint on the Pegasus World Cup undercard. He had fractured his ankle, tibia, and fibula, and would require two surgeries before the road back could even begin. Past The Wire was there in the early stages of that road, and recently we sat down with Rispoli for his first video interview before his return, and the conversation was a reminder of what makes him different from the average rider: a quiet intensity, a competitive intelligence, and an absolute refusal to frame the injury as anything but a temporary detour.
Saturday at Los Alamitos, the detour ended. Bob Baffert didn’t ease Rispoli back in with a short-field allowance and a modest price tag. He put him on Faran, the $3.4 million topper from the 2024 Fasig-Tipton Saratoga sale, purchased by Donato Lanni on behalf of Amr Zedan’s Zedan Racing Stable, a Not This Time colt making his career debut in the fourth race. Rispoli got the job done, guiding Faran to the winner’s circle at odds of $3.20 over six and a half furlongs in 1:16.74. First mount back. First win. Bob Baffert doesn’t hand $3.4 million horses to riders he doesn’t trust. The assignment itself said everything.
Rispoli noted afterward that having worked Faran in the mornings, he already knew what the colt was capable of — and that winning first time back meant something deeper than just a number in the book. He drew the parallel himself to a previous leg injury in Hong Kong, saying it had taken months to get back to the winner’s circle that time. This time, it took one race. He dedicated the win to his family, his wife and children who stood with him through what he called five extremely difficult months. Del Mar opens July 17. Umberto Rispoli will be there.
