American Pharoah scored the Triple Crown with this evening’s win at the Belmont Stakes, and that’s a really big deal. We’re thinking that jockey Victor Espinoza might want to keep on racing out of town, though. That’s because he’s caught up in a romantic triangle that’s a Triple Crown of weirdness. [photo: Rob Carr/Getty]
In case you don’t follow jockeys on the red carpet, here’s the deal: Victor has been regularly seen with statuesque blonde Julie Kunkel regularly towering over him. Lately, though, Victor’s been towered over by 19-year-old Kelly Kovalchick. And that’s made for a very unhappy Mrs. Kunkel–that being Julie’s mom, who’s complained to the New York Post, “He’s engaged to my daughter!”
Kelly’s Instagram account sure doesn’t seem to make that believable, though, courtesy of pics like this…
And now Victor’s agent, Brian Beach, is insisting that his client doesn’t even have a girlfriend. Which we’d also be saying if we were hitting the clubs after riding our way to a Triple Crown.
And just so we can show off our horse sense, let’s also acknowledge a nice comeback on the Belmont Stakes undercard by Honor Code–who managed a three-length win for the $1.25 million Metropolitan Handicap. That was his fifth win in eight starts, and the end of a good year for a horse that was once considered to be a Triple Crown contender himself. He got knocked out of competition last year with an injury, and barely raced in 2014. It’s still hard to judge if Honor Code is having a better or worse day than Victor Espinoza right now.
