Cindy and Larry Jones will return for their fifth year of thoroughbred racing at Delaware Park, but with a slight twist of roles - Cindy as the head trainer and Larry as the assistant.

Since the end of the Delaware Park meet in 2009, Cindy and Larry have reversed roles. Cindy has been the top person in the barn and Larry has been staffed as the assistant trainer. The transition has gone smoothly, and according to Cindy, good help has been the key to success.

“After the Breeders’ Cup, Larry retired and put all of the horses in my name,” Cindy Jones said from her barn at Delaware Park. “I have a lot of good help, including the most accomplished assistance trainer in the world - Larry. With him by my side, I do not have to worry about anything. We both still do exactly the same things we have always done. The real difference is that we have cut down on the number of people we train for and Larry does a little less talking on the phone.”

Race fans should expect another solid meet from the Jones barn. The meet, which is the 73rd season of live racing at Delaware Park, will get underway on Kentucky Derby Day (May 1). The 116-day season will feature live racing on Saturdays, Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays with Thursday cards from July 15 through August 26. Daily first race post time will be 1:15 p.m. Parking and admission are free.

As the trainer, Cindy hit the ground running by notching a victory with the first horse she saddled on Nov. 13, 2009.

“It was thrilling to win my first race,” she said. “I won that race at Churchill Downs with the first horse I entered in my name, No Such Word. And then we went to Hot Springs, Arkansas, and she won my first race there and my first Graded stake race ever.”

Cindy Jones was also pleased with her results at the recently concluded Oaklawn meet. She finished with a record of eight wins, five seconds and three thirds from 49 starts.

“It was great,” Jones said, who will have approximately 40 horses stable at Delaware Park. “We got off to a little bit of a slow start, but it turned out very well with eight wins and two Graded stakes wins."

She is expecting those results to carryover to Delaware Park this season.

“I think we brought a lot of nice horses,” she said. “And we have some promising 2-year-olds that we cannot wait to get going. We feel real good about this meet and we think we will make our presence felt.”

At Delaware Park, the Jones barn has always done well in the stakes category. As a matter of fact the first Delaware Park race they ever won was the 2005 Delaware Handicap with Island Sand. So it is only natural that a couple of horses to watch will be in this category.

“No Such Word and Payton d’ Oro both won stakes at Oaklawn and Just Jenda came out of the Apple Blossom reallywell,” Cindy Jones said. “And we also have Haven’s Honey who may be our Del Cap horse if everything turns out as we hope because she can run all day long and ran in the allowance race at Oaklawn and got beat two heads against multiple Graded stake horses.”