How Running Found Jockey By Sara Stover
KeOlaMagazine.com | September-October 2021
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rowing up in Hōlualoa, Jon Kunitake’s knowledge of horses was limited to the paniolo (cowboys) of Waimea. His early life revolved around coffee, leaving little time for any extracurricular activities. Born in a house on a coffee farm next door to the Imin Center, Jon was the fifth of 13 children, all of whom picked coffee in the fields of Hōlualoa when they weren’t attending school. “My grandparents came from Fukuoka, Japan to work on the Ka‘ū plantations and my parents settled in Hōlualoa,” says Jon as he gently prunes the leaves of a young coffee tree by hand. “We had a big family and even though we had our own farm, we were so poor that we had to pick coffee for other farms to pay for bus fare and rice.” Riding the Highs and Lows of Jockey Life By the time Jon graduated from Konawaena High School, he was ready to accept a cousin’s invitation to move to California. Once there, he worked at a race track, cleaning the stalls. While the labor wasn’t glamorous, a childhood spent working hard made Jon well-suited for the job. Uncle Jonny wearing Bib No. 1 in the 100% Pure Kona Coffee Half Marathon, an honor bestowed upon him for his role as co-founder. photo courtesy of Mikey Brown
It wasn’t long before others took notice of his excellent work ethic, and he was entrusted with riding the trainer’s horse during morning exercise runs on the track. “There was talk of taking me to Idaho and grooming me to be a jockey, but I wanted to stay at the track because my boss treated me well and I was happy in the stables. Then my boss told me to go, so three days later, I was off,” Jon recalls. “One day I was shoveling horse manure, the next I was on my way to riding at the most affluent race tracks around. Racing found me!” “I remember it like it was yesterday,” exclaims Jon, who was 20 years old when he began racing in Centennial Park, Colorado. “When I won my second race, everyone was so happy, from the groomer to the trainer.” The win catapulted Jon into life as a professional jockey, which often included racing six days a week. He recalls, “Sometimes we’d have nine races a day. That’s 500 to 600 races a year!” “I was making good money, but I was too tired to celebrate,” he notes. “And I had to get up at 4:30am, so I would just go back to the apartment I was renting and sleep.” Little did he know that his commitment to racing and recovering were equipping Jon with the endurance and habits he’d need to compete in a much “One day I was shoveling horse manure, the next I was on my way to riding at the most affluent race tracks around!” says Hölualoa´s Jon Kunitake. photo courtesy of Jon Kunitake
