One of his older brothers, Scott, became a professional jockey, and at age 12 Stevens had decided to do the same. By the time he was 14, he was riding
American Quarter Horses at small
bush tracks. At age 16 he switched to Thoroughbreds, and at 17 won his first race at
Les Bois Park, in
Boise, Idaho on Little Star, a horse trained by his father. After leaving high school, he spent four months in southern California working for
horse trainer Chuck Taliaferro, who had helped develop other young jockeys, including
Steve Cauthen and
Cash Asmussen. He returned to Boise for about a year, then rode from 1981 to 1982 at
Portland Meadows, where he won two awards for his race riding. He went on to
Longacres, near
Seattle from 1982 through 1984, where he won 524 times, including a number of
graded stakes races, broke numerous riding records and was the leading rider two years in a row. He won the
Santa Anita Derby nine times, At the time of his 2005 temporary retirement, his mounts had collected over $221 million with 4,888 winners in North America, ranking Stevens fifth in all-time winnings at the time. when including overseas victories, including 49 wins in the UK, Stevens considers his 5,000th win to have been in the Gaviola Stakes on October 30, 2005. Coming back in 2013, he won the Preakness Stakes on
Oxbow and added additional wins to his lifetime total, including an international victory in the
Shergar Cup at
Ascot Racecourse that raised his total win record in the United Kingdom to 50. By 2014, his earnings stood at $236,951,490 and his North American wins were at 4,988. He reached his official 5,000th North American win at Santa Anita Park on February 13, 2015, on a horse named Catch a Flight, trained by
Richard Mandella. He retired briefly from racing for ten months in 1999–2000 due to knee problems, In 2002, Stevens wrote a book about his life up to that point titled
The Perfect Ride. Hall of Fame sportscaster
Jack Whitaker described it as: "a great read, not only for horse racing fans, but for anyone interested in how the American dream really works." In November 2005, Stevens announced a second retirement. His decision was again linked to knee problems, but he reached it a week after
Rock Hard Ten, whom he rode to a second-place in the 2004 Preakness Stakes, was retired due to a foot injury. Describing the horse at the time as the best horse he had ever ridden, Stevens said, "He's retiring, I'm retiring." Stevens rode his last races of that year on November 26 at
Churchill Downs. During his retirement, in addition to sportscasting and television work, Stevens worked as a jockey agent in 2007, representing
Corey Nakatani. In 2009, Stevens also became a
horse trainer with the assistance of his son, T.C. Stevens, based at Santa Anita.
Film and television In the 2003 movie
Seabiscuit, Stevens played jockey
George Woolf, receiving generally positive reviews. He was recruited for the role in 2002 by the director,
Gary Ross, and worked for four months on the film. In 2011 he became a regular cast member on the
HBO television series
Luck produced by Thoroughbred owner
David Milch, starring as an on-the-skids jockey named Ronnie. The cancellation of the show in 2012 prior to the beginning of its second season turned out to provide Stevens with the inspiration to return to actual race riding. On January 12, 2013, Stevens won the first race of his comeback in a
maiden race aboard the filly Branding. Stevens' first graded stakes win of his comeback came in the 2013
San Marcos Stakes on Slim Shadey. He reconnected with
D. Wayne Lukas for the Triple Crown series on a horse named
Oxbow. The team finished sixth in the
2013 Kentucky Derby, and on May 18, 2013, Stevens and Oxbow won the
2013 Preakness Stakes, his third Preakness win, and on the same day won the Dixieland Stakes on the undercard with the Lukas-trained Skyring. After a second-place finish in the Belmont, Stevens continued to ride regularly the rest of the year, and on November 1–2 at
Santa Anita Park, Stevens won his third
Breeders' Cup Distaff with
Beholder as well as his first
Breeders' Cup Classic aboard
Mucho Macho Man. His Classic win was the first in 15 total attempts, and he was the only jockey to have ridden in both the first Breeders' Cup in 1984 and in the 30th in 2013. He finished the year 12th in the nation by earnings with 69 wins from 383 races and his lifetime wins total stood at 4,957. 2013 marked Stevens' third most successful year since 2000, comparing favorably to his 23 graded stakes wins from 487 starts and 94 wins in 2005 and 532 starts with 99 wins with 22 graded stakes wins in 2001. Coincidentally, in the same week, Mucho Macho Man was retired from racing, marking the second time a Stevens break coincided with the retirement of a horse he had ridden to racing success. Following surgery in late July 2014, he returned to riding in morning workouts in mid-October 2014 and accepted mounts for the 2014 Breeders' Cup in the
Juvenile Fillies Turf and
Breeders' Cup Sprint.
Injuries in 2016, two years after his knee replacement surgery Stevens' career as a jockey has been punctuated by a number of significant injuries. His first major accident was a starting gate training incident in 1985 when a horse threw him into the rail, putting him into a coma for 16 hours and causing serious injuries to his shoulder and right knee. In 2003, he suffered major injuries in the
Arlington Million when his horse, in first place, spooked at the finish line, throwing him in front of the rest of the field, where one horse stepped on him, resulting in a collapsed lung and neck injuries. He returned to racing 19 days later. Over the years, he had gone through approximately a dozen medical procedures on his right knee and three on his left, mostly
arthroscopic surgeries. In addition to his knee problems, he also had assorted surgeries on his right wrist and both shoulders. By 2014, his right knee required a total
knee replacement. Medical testing revealed he also had been riding with a completely torn
ACL. Following surgery, Stevens stated that he developed an addiction to the prescription painkillers he was given, so he isolated himself for a week and went off the medication
cold turkey, after which he felt that he finally began to fully recover from the surgery. Three months after the operation, he returned to racing, working horses in the morning, and accepted mounts for the 2014 Breeders' Cup. He returned to graded stakes-winning form with a Grade II win in the Grade II
Arcadia Handicap on January 31, 2015:53 and achieved his 5,000th North American win on February 13, 2015. but indicated that 2017 might be his last year of racing, with the caveat, "unless I come up with a really good 2-year-old who looks like he'll be a major contender for the 2018 Kentucky Derby." He returned to race riding on March 10, and rode a winning horse on March 11, 2017. Due to his multiple joint replacements, "The
Bionic Man" became one of his nicknames.
Permanent riding retirement On November 20, 2018, Stevens announced he was retiring as a jockey for good due to a neck injury that resulted from an accident at Del Mar on November 17. What was initially believed to be a pinched nerve turned out to be more serious. “[T]he
C-4 is up against the spinal cord,” he said, “There won't be any comeback from this one.” He made the decision after doctors informed him that the spinal injury could lead to a far more serious issue if he were to ever fall again. In 2019, he returned to being a sportscaster, working as a racing analyst for
Fox Sports. ==Awards==