Golden Tempo Wins Kentucky Derby; Cherie DeVaux Becomes First Woman to Train the Winner

Golden Tempo was dead last entering the far turn at Churchill Downs on May 2, 2026. Two minutes and 2.27 seconds later, the homebred colt had rallied past 19 rivals to win the 152nd Kentucky Derby by a nose — and his trainer, Cherie DeVaux, had shattered a barrier that stood for every one of the race's previous 151 runnings [1][2].

DeVaux, 44, became the first woman to train the Kentucky Derby winner, and only the second female trainer to win any Triple Crown race, following Jena Antonucci's 2023 Belmont Stakes victory with Arcangelo [3]. In a sport where only 17 women had ever saddled a Derby starter before Saturday, the magnitude of the achievement is difficult to overstate [4].

"I'm just so, so, so happy for Golden Tempo," DeVaux said after the race. "Jose did a wonderful job, a masterful job at getting him there" [5]. She added: "I'm glad I can be representative of women everywhere. We can do anything we set our minds to" [5].

The Race: A Last-to-First Derby Upset

Golden Tempo, co-owned by the historic Phipps Stable (Daisy Phipps Pulito) and Vincent Viola's St. Elias Stable, went off at 23-1 odds — making him the longest-priced Derby winner since Rich Strike's 80-1 shocker in 2022 [2][6]. The victory extended a streak: no betting favorite has won the Derby since Justify at 5-2 in 2018, now eight consecutive years [6].

Under jockey Jose Ortiz, Golden Tempo settled at the back of the 20-horse field before launching a sustained rally through the stretch. He caught the favored Renegade (5-1), ridden by Jose's brother Irad Ortiz Jr., at the wire in a photo finish [1][2]. Ocelli, a 70-1 longshot, ran third, followed by Chief Wallabee in fourth [2].

The $5 million purse awarded $3.1 million to the winning connections — split among owners, jockey, and trainer [7].

DeVaux's Path: From Stable Worker to Derby Winner

DeVaux's journey to the Derby winner's circle began in Saratoga Springs, New York, where she started as a stable worker for the late trainer Chuck Simon [5][8]. She spent six years with Simon before joining Chad Brown's operation as an assistant trainer, where she worked for eight more years. She was instrumental in managing the return of champion filly Lady Eli from a life-threatening bout of laminitis [8].

In 2018, DeVaux took out her own trainer's license. "I was burned out from being an assistant trainer," she told NBC News. "I wanted to do something more for myself, have a little bit more of a personal life" [5]. She sent out her first winner 11 months later — Travelling, at Gulfstream Park in March 2019 [9].

The trajectory since then has been steep. DeVaux began with roughly 12 horses; she now manages approximately 120 runners from her base at Keeneland, with a summer string at Saratoga [9]. Her annual earnings have climbed from around $500,000 in her first full year to $8.4 million in 2024, the year she won the Breeders' Cup Mile with More Than Looks [9][10].

Source: America's Best Racing / Equibase

Data as of May 2, 2026CSV

By the end of 2025, DeVaux had accumulated more than $32.9 million in career earnings with 272 wins [8]. She trained She Feels Pretty to the 2025 Eclipse Award as champion turf female — DeVaux's first Eclipse Award winner [10]. Her 2026 earnings stood at $2.1 million before the Derby, with a 16% win rate [8].

Golden Tempo: A Homebred on an Unconventional Path

Unlike many Derby contenders purchased for six- or seven-figure sums at yearling sales, Golden Tempo was homebred — bred and raised by his ownership group rather than bought at auction [7]. Among non-homebred Derby starters in 2026, the average purchase price was $492,445 [7]. Golden Tempo's breeding — by Curlin out of a Bernardini mare named Carrumba, who won at 1⅛ miles — offered a classic pedigree for stamina [7].

His path to Louisville was not the typical prep-race coronation of a front-running favorite. Golden Tempo won his maiden in his sole juvenile start at Fair Grounds on December 20, 2025, rallying from last to first [11]. As a three-year-old, he won the Grade 3 Lecomte Stakes as the favorite, then finished third in both the Grade 2 Risen Star Stakes and the Louisiana Derby [11]. A fifth-place finish in the Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland gave few observers reason to tab him as a Derby threat [11].

DeVaux, however, noted before the race that the horse had "matured both physically and mentally" and was peaking at the right time [6]. The result vindicated her patience.

152 Years: The Long Wait for a Female Trainer

The Kentucky Derby was first run in 1875. For 151 years, no woman trained its winner. In the first 151 runnings, only 17 women saddled a starter [4].

Source: Kentucky Derby Records / ESPN

Data as of May 2, 2026CSV

The closest call came in 1992, when Shelley Riley's Casual Lies — a $7,500 purchase — surged to the front in the stretch before losing to Lil E. Tee by one length [12]. Two weeks later, Casual Lies finished third in the Preakness. Riley remains the only woman to have trained a horse that finished in the money in two Triple Crown races in the same year [12].

The structural reasons for this exclusion run deeper than talent. Thoroughbred training at the elite level requires access to wealthy owners willing to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on yearlings, stable space at premier tracks, and the network connections to attract high-value racing stock. These networks have been male-dominated for generations [13].

"Being a female in this industry, the standards aren't always equal," DeVaux has said. "In the back of my mind is to always be a strong role model for those that aren't like me" [5].

The Scale Problem: Boutique Operations vs. Mega-Stables

To understand why so few women have reached the Derby, consider the economics. Todd Pletcher, the all-time leading trainer by North American earnings ($521 million and counting), has entered 66 horses in the Kentucky Derby across his career — 15 more than any other trainer [14]. Bob Baffert has won the race six times, tying the all-time trainer record, and had two starters in the 2026 edition alone [14]. Both men have won 19-30% of their starts in 2026, backed by ownership groups that funnel the most expensive and most promising horses to their barns [14].

DeVaux's 120-horse operation is substantial but not comparable to these mega-stables. In 2023, she ranked 26th nationally with 56 wins from 309 starts [9]. Her 2024 campaign — 347 starts, 51 wins — reflected continued growth but remained a fraction of the volume Pletcher and Baffert command [9].

The auction pipeline matters, too. At Keeneland and Fasig-Tipton sales, the most expensive yearlings are typically consigned to the sport's most established trainers. Homebreds like Golden Tempo offer an alternative path, but the systemic pattern favors trainers who already sit atop the hierarchy — a self-reinforcing cycle that has historically excluded women.

The International Comparison: Is the U.S. an Outlier?

Globally, women have reached the summit of flat racing in ways that make the American experience look notably slow.

In France, Criquette Head-Maarek trained more than 80 Group 1 winners across six countries, including back-to-back Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe victories with Treve in 2013 and 2014 — becoming the first female trainer to win Europe's most prestigious race [15]. In Australia, Gai Waterhouse has trained 145 Group 1 winners and won seven Sydney trainers' premierships, including the 2013 Melbourne Cup with Fiorente [16]. In Ireland, Jessica Harrington has risen to the top tier of both flat and jumps training [15].

The contrast is stark. While the TRC Global Rankings list 24 women among the world's top 500 trainers — with the U.S. contributing seven and Australia five [15] — America's marquee races have been the slowest to see female winners. The Breeders' Cup has had seven different women train winners (including Jenine Sahadi, Laura de Seroux, Carla Gaines, and Kathy Ritvo), but the Derby and Preakness remained all-male until now [15].

The broader horse industry complicates the picture further. According to demographic data, roughly 67% of all horse trainers in the U.S. (across all disciplines) are female [17]. But in thoroughbred racing at the top level, the numbers invert dramatically. The gap between grassroots participation and elite representation suggests that the barriers are not about interest or competence but about the gatekeeping structures — ownership networks, capital access, track allocations — that sit between a trainer's license and a Derby saddle cloth.

What History Says About Durability

The record of past gender milestones in racing provides both encouragement and caution.

Source: Triple Crown Records

Data as of May 2, 2026CSV

Julie Krone became the first female jockey to win a Triple Crown race with Colonial Affair in the 1993 Belmont Stakes [18]. She was inducted into the Racing Hall of Fame in 2000 [18]. Rosie Napravnik later broke Krone's records for wins and earnings by a female jockey, became the first woman to win the Kentucky Oaks in 2012, and competed in all three Triple Crown races in a single season in 2013 [19].

Yet female jockeys still represent only about 10% of all jockeys in American racing, a number that has barely moved in decades [19]. In the United Kingdom, female jockeys went from 5.7% of rides in 2010 to 9.62% in 2021 — progress, but hardly a transformation [19]. Napravnik herself encountered owners and trainers who refused to hire a female jockey early in her career [19].

The pattern is familiar: a high-profile breakthrough generates headlines and genuine inspiration but does not, by itself, dismantle the structural and cultural factors that produced the disparity. Krone won the Belmont in 1993. Thirty years passed before Antonucci became the first female trainer to win a Triple Crown race. Three years later, DeVaux won the Derby. The pace has quickened — but whether it holds depends on factors well beyond any single race.

What Women Trainers Say Has Changed — and What Hasn't

Jena Antonucci, who won the 2023 Belmont with Arcangelo after never having started a horse in a Grade 1 race, has spoken openly about the steeper climb women face in securing high-quality stock [3]. Before Arcangelo, she worked as a veterinary assistant and trained under D. Wayne Lukas before taking out her license in 2010 [3].

Linda Rice, who set a single-year record with 165 victories and became the first woman to win the Saratoga training title outright in 2009, has been one of the most consistent female performers in American racing [15]. But her success on the New York circuit has not translated into a flood of female entries in Triple Crown races.

At the 2024 Preakness, DeVaux became the first woman trainer to earn the $50,000 leading trainer bonus after winning three stakes on Black-Eyed Susan Day [9]. She entered five horses in the 2024 Breeders' Cup across five different races [9]. These were not token entries — they reflected an operation building genuine depth.

The question now is whether DeVaux's Derby win opens doors for others or remains, as one racing analyst put it, "an inspiring anomaly." The economics of thoroughbred racing at the highest level — where a single horse can cost millions and a trainer's reputation is the currency that attracts owners — create a winner-take-most dynamic that is difficult for any newcomer, regardless of gender, to crack.

What Comes Next

Golden Tempo's connections have not yet announced whether the colt will contest the Preakness Stakes on May 16. If he does, DeVaux would have the chance to become the first woman to win two legs of the Triple Crown.

The Derby purse of $3.1 million gives her operation a major financial boost — her 2026 earnings roughly tripled in a single afternoon. But the larger question is whether the sport's power brokers — the owners, breeders, and sales companies who determine which trainers get access to the best horses — will see DeVaux's victory as evidence that the old patterns should change, or whether one extraordinary afternoon at Churchill Downs will be absorbed into the sport's long, slow reckoning with its own demographics.

DeVaux, for her part, does not appear to be waiting for permission. "We can do anything we set our minds to," she said Saturday, standing in the winner's circle that took 152 years to open [5].