Jamie Spencer, a former champion jockey in Britain and Ireland, has shifted his riding base to Southern California and will begin a sustained campaign at Santa Anita with four scheduled mounts from October 10-12. At 46, this marks the first time Spencer has committed to riding full-time in the United States, turning a string of high-profile North American raid wins into an extended West Coast presence.
According to entry information and booking reports, Spencer is set for two rides on Saturday at Santa Anita, including Ellen Jorth in a mid-card race and Santa Barbarian in a later event on the program. He is then booked on Brawler in Sunday's seventh race and on Tirupati in Monday's Swingtime Stakes, a one-mile turf event for fillies and mares that anchors a special holiday card. Those four mounts come for a trio of California trainers—Phil D'Amato, Ryan Hanson, and Jonathan Thomas—signaling that Spencer is immediately plugging into barns with established turf programs and graded-stakes ambitions.
Spencer arrives in California riding the wave of a standout autumn that has showcased his turf expertise on both sides of the Atlantic. In late September he captured the Grade 1 Canadian International at Woodbine aboard Arabian Crown for Charlie Appleby and Godolphin, adding another major North American trophy to a résumé already stacked with top-level success. Earlier in the Kentucky Downs meet he partnered European shippers to graded stakes wins, including a notable score on Haatem and another on Take Charge Star, underlining how effectively he translates his patient, cover-seeking style to American turf configurations.
California has long been friendly territory for Spencer in the Breeders' Cup era, even if it has yet to produce a local victory. He has ridden in a dozen Breeders' Cup races at Santa Anita, notably finishing second on Toast of New York in the 2014 Classic and third on Trade Storm in the Mile and Just the Judge in the Filly and Mare Turf that same year. Despite those near-misses, reports indicate he had not previously won a race in California, which adds a personal edge to this relocation: the experienced European tactician is now basing himself at the very track where his biggest American moments have so far been agonizingly close.
From a colony standpoint, Spencer's arrival deepens an already competitive jockey room and introduces a rider whose hallmark is cool-handed timing on firm turf, often delivered from off the pace with a late, weaving run. His own comments to industry outlets—“Why not come here and see how it goes” and noting that he has been busy working horses in the morning—underscore that this is a calculated test of California as a longer-term base rather than a brief hit-and-run raid. For turf-centric barns like D'Amato's and rising outfits such as those of Hanson and Thomas, having a jockey with decades of big-race European experience is a tactical weapon, especially in races like the Swingtime Stakes where rhythm and patience around a tight mile can decide everything.
The Swingtime itself shapes up as a wide-open affair with eight fillies and mares entered, and Spencer's booking on Tirupati gives him an immediate stakes-stage platform to showcase his style to the Santa Anita betting public. The current Santa Anita meet runs through November 1, after which attention shifts slightly south to the Del Mar autumn session beginning November 6, where Spencer also intends to ride, indicating this is not a Santa Anita-only experiment. His calendar will briefly tilt international again when he flies to Melbourne to partner Royal Supremacy in the Group 1 Caulfield Cup on October 17, but the broader plan points back to Southern California, where his presence is poised to reshape how bettors and trainers approach the region's turf stakes this fall.
