Skip to:

Donna Brothers

Biography: 

Donna Barton Brothers was born into horse racing. Her mother, Patti Barton, was one of the first half dozen women to be licensed as a jockey in the United States—that was in 1969. Throughout Patti Barton’s career (and until four years after her retirement) she was leading female rider in the nation by number of wins. She retired in 1984 with just over 1,200 wins.

Both Donna’s brother, Jerry, and sister, Leah, were jockeys but by the time Donna started riding professionally in 1987 her mother, brother and sister had all retired from riding. As “Donna Barton”, Barton rode races from 1987 to 1998 and retired in 1998 as the second leading female jockey in the United States by money earned. She won 1,130 races. 1998 was also the year she married horse trainer (since retired from training) Frank Brothers.

In 1999 she began dabbling in television coverage of horse racing and in 2000 covered the Breeders’ Cup Championships for NBC Sports. She has covered horse racing and other horse sports (and bull riding) for NBC and NBCSN since 2000 and, during that time, has covered 17 Kentucky Derbies and, memorably, the Triple Crown captured by American Pharoah in 2015. 

Brothers is also an author and wrote Inside Track: Insider’s Guide to Horse Racing in 2011. The book is in it’s second publishing and is intended to bridge the gap between the novice horse racing fan and the, at times, complicated sport of horse racing. She also serves as Chief Operating Officer for Starlight and StarLadies Racing. Her husband, Frank, is the bloodstock agent for Starlight/StarLadies Racing and is also a member of the Yearling Selection Team for Keeneland Sales.