Adam Campola This is Me

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1. 1. Thoroughbred Times: News Archive

   www.thoroughbredtimes.com/toda - [Cached]

   Published on: 4/1/2006   Last Visited: 9/5/2006

   Michigan's Office of Racing Commissioners recently named Adam Campola, a former jockey and clerk of scales at Maryland racetracks since 2000, as steward at Great Lakes Downs for the meet that opens on May 6.
   
   Campola's position as clerk of scales for the Maryland Jockey Club will be filled by Frank Saumell.
   ...
   "To get a shot at a full-time position is a first step for the next chapter," said Campola, who rode 450 winners during his jockey career between 1980 and 1991.

2. 2. TimesDispatch.com | His passion for horse racing never wavers

   www.timesdispatch.com/servlet/ - [Cached]

   Published on: 7/28/2005   Last Visited: 7/28/2005

   Adam Campola probably was destined to sell cars, which is what his father and grandfathers did back in Ohio near Cleveland.
   ...
   "And I asked him, 'What is that?'" Adam Campola said.
   
   In this case, father definitely knew best even though there were times this one of six Campola siblings had reason to wonder. Ask Campola about injuries, and he begins here and works up there and down here, all over his body. His left arm was shattered in a riding accident.
   
   Ironically, most of the serious stuff happened while galloping horses in the morning. There was the aforementioned arm. A broken collarbone. One day the horse he was galloping stumbled, and Campola fell off, except his foot was caught, and the crazed animal began dragging him up the track.
   
   "I was under the horse, screaming, until I worked my foot out," Campola said. "When I stopped screaming, they thought I was dead."
   
   As it turned out, he came out of that pretty much in one piece. Funny, but he smiles with the telling of every incident, every mishap, the bad as well as the good of a business that now he can't see himself being without.
   
   "I love the sport," Campola said with unquestionable sincerity. "It's what I know."
   
   He learned, but not the way most riders do by growing up with the sport. Campola went to the local library "and looked it up," he said.
   
   He was 15 years old when he went to Thistledown and asked a security guard how to become a jockey. The guard sent him to a trainer, who -- coincidence of coincidences -- happened to know Campola's grandfathers. He spent a summer doing every menial task known to horses and horse racing and never looked back.
   
   This is about 43-year-old Adam Campola, in his sixth year as Colonial Downs' clerk of scales. But to understand him and why people who know think he's about the best there is at what he does, some background helps.
   
   He jocked for 8, years and won about 500 races. He finally came to Maryland and, with a wife and two children, decided to settle down.
   
   Campola went from being a jockey to just galloping horses in the morning and working the parking lots at Pimlico and Laurel in the afternoon to becoming an agent for Joseph Rocco Sr. "I thought we did well, but I didn't care for it much," Campola said. Campola went from being a jockey to just galloping horses in the morning and working the parking lots at Pimlico and Laurel in the afternoon to becoming an agent for Joseph Rocco Sr. "I thought we did well, but I didn't care for it much," Campola said.
   ...
   Campola has a lot of compassion to go around, which -- we're told -- make the jockey's room here a model in a tough business where people aren't always known to get along.
   
   "As far as I'm concerned, he's the best," said valet Richard Ramkhelawan, who has known Campola a long time.
   ...
   It's hard to maintain a confidence level all the time, and I try to help them," Campola said.
   ...
   There's very little jealousy," Campola said.
   
   He cares so much about their well-being that the mere mention of Colonial apprentice jockey Emanuel Jose Sanchez, who died suddenly over the weekend, makes Campola misty.
   
   Wife Tracy is a jockey's agent. Campola sees himself in horse racing forever. Next step: Becoming a steward. He's already an alternate here.
   
   "They don't have to be leading riders," Campola said.

3. 3. Thoroughbred Times: Today's News

   www.thoroughbredtimes.com/toda - [Cached]

   Published on: 4/1/2006   Last Visited: 4/2/2006

   Michigan's Office of Racing Commissioners recently named Adam Campola, a former jockey and clerk of scales at Maryland racetracks since 2000, as steward at Great Lakes Downs for the meet that opens on May 6.
   
   Campola's position as clerk of scales for the Maryland Jockey Club will be filled by Frank Saumell.
   ...
   "To get a shot at a full-time position is a first step for the next chapter," said Campola, who rode 450 winners during his jockey career between 1980 and 1991.