Michel Lapensee, 1947-2005
Talk to a jockey about the dangers of riding and they’ll point out that they’re the only athletes followed by an ambulance. The statement is both fatalistic joke and stark acknowledgment of fact. No jockey gets through a career without injuries; an unfortunate few are permanently disabled or killed riding. Such was the fate of Michel Lapensee, who died last Friday from injuries he suffered in an accident at Suffolk Downs on October 24.
Hundreds of mourners gathered in a Providence church this morning to remember and honor the 58-year-old rider as a husband, father, colleague, and friend. The ceremony was simple and emotional, a burial mass followed by two eulogists. Lapensee’s niece read from a piece she wrote while her uncle lay in intensive care, in which she touched on the question that must have crossed the minds of many others when they heard the news of Lapensee’s death — “Was feeling at one with an animal … worth this?” She was followed by an old friend of Lapensee, who recalled his humor and graciousness, his love of fishing, and his passion for racing. “I can still hear his voice, from when he broke his maiden at Green Mountain. He was in front of me, yelling, ‘I’m going to win, I’m going to win!'” It was that thrill and joy that kept Lapensee at the track long after most jockeys have retired. Walking away from the sport was “never an option,” Lapensee’s son, Michel Jr., told the Boston Globe.
In his 38-year career, Lapensee won 2,678 races from more than 20,000 starts. “When my dad was working,” said Michel Jr., “he was one with the horse.” Lapensee is best known for riding Playing Politics, who in 1998, at the age of 16, became the oldest horse to ever win a race at Suffolk Downs. “He was the oldest racehorse of his generation and would not have achieved the honor without the help and companionship of one Michel Lapensee,” writes Paul Daley in his remembrance of the jockey.
“Mike got on the horse and gave his best,” said trainer Mario DeStefano. On October 24, Lapensee climbed aboard Mecke’s Money for that afternoon’s ninth race. On the far turn, the six-year-old gelding broke his left front cannon bone and fell, throwing Lapensee. It was a $4,000 claiming race. There was no glory to be had but that inherent in riding a thoroughbred at top speed, in doing his best on the racetrack. Lapensee’s dedication to riding kept him coming back, doing the only work he knew and loved, and in the end, it killed him. Was feeling at one with an animal worth a man’s death? That’s impossible to answer. But the presence of so many this morning testified that a life spent riding was not a life spent in vain.
