‘Spuddy’ Rickman, Aiello to call Jamaica Cup as a team

ALREADY excited that celebrated Gulfstream Park race caller, Peter Aiello, will be joining Jamaica’s all-time great, Brian ‘Spuddy’ Rickman, in the box at Caymanas Park this afternoon, fans will be treated to a first in the history of local-racing commentary – both announcers calling the Jamaica Cup feature race.

“Pete will call to the half-mile and I will pick it up from there,” said Rickman, adding that the duo will similarly bring down the curtain on Jamaica Cup day in the closing event at six and a half furlongs.

“I have done it three times, more than 10 years ago,” said Aiello, a big fan of Jamaican racing, who celebrates his 38th birthday at Caymanas Park today.

“I did it with Mark Johnson,who calls races in the United Kingdom. He was working at Churchill Downs at the time. They challenged me. I was a young kid then. It was a perfect hand-off. The next two times, I did it with US guys but it didn’t go too well,” added Aiello, who is on his first trip to the island but knows its racing personalities as though he was a regular at Caymanas Park.

“I used to say I have the record for being the horse-racing person to have worked at the farthest northern and southern tracks but, if you add Jamaica, Trevor Simpson has me beaten because he has also ridden at Evergreen Park,” Aiello joked, referring to the five-time Jamaican champion, who does stints at the Grand Prairie, Alberta, racetrack in Canada, one of the many at which he has called races in North America.

Happy to finally meet Rickman, Aiello, who will go solo in calling the second, third, fourth and seventh events, said he was impressed by his counterpart’s humility.

“In the states, it is very rare when one guy comes into another guy’s territory and the guy that’s home-based is as happy as they guy coming in,” he pointed out.

“He is a great announcer. I texted him after the (Jamaica) derby. I said I dream of the day I am as smooth as you are. He is smooth. I think, stylistically, we are very similar. He arches to the top. I arch to the top. The only difference I can think of is I am way louder than him,” added Aiello.

Rickman’s line, “… presses the eject button and gets rid of the rider”, cracks up Aiello every time.

“I laugh every time I watch that replay,” he said, pointing out that he is not allowed to be so creative although his “Eaaazzzzy money” has been accepted by his bosses at Gulfstream Park in Florida.

“It’s a major problem. They wanted to pull me up on “Eaaazzzzy money”, he said, recalling how he came up with the phrase to describe an odds-on horse winning easily.

“I was in Cincinnati at River Downs. We had five or six horse fields all day. I just had to invent something to entertain myself. It was 1-5 after 1-5, winning all day, so at the end of a race I said, ’Eaaazzzzy money’”.

Rickman, in his usual candid style, described Aiello as “a normal person”.

“He has no airs about him, nor is he a stuck-up individual. He gets on well with everybody. He was at exercise this morning with all the trainers having fun.”

Describing Jamaican racing as “passionate”, Aiello believes that is what draws him to being a fan.

“I feel the passion. I feel it from the fans, the riders. It’s pride and passion, something I resonate with, working the bush tracks in Arizona where they run for pride, certainly not the money.

“Caymanas Park is also as all-year circuit, which has a lot of storylines. It’s not like the bigger tracks, Gulfstream, for example, where people are moving all the time.”

Aiello was drawn to racing through his grandfather, who was into greyhound (dog) racing.

“I guess that’s how the gambling part started. My grandfather got into the business. He was a gambler first then opened his own kennel operations,” he said, adding that he attended the University of Arizona, completing a specialised business degree in horse racing.

“I started calling races while in school. I called my first race in Arizona, 2005, Rillito Park. I graduated in the winter of 2007. I had my first announcer’s job at River Downs in Cincinnati, Ohio, in the summer of 2008.”

Rickman started commentating at Caymanas Park in 1979 and was nationally honoured with an Order of Distinction, Officer Class, in 2019 for his contribution to nation building in the field of sports.