Mike Smith starts his off day with a run.

Maybe he’ll go for a hike instead some days, or if the weather is bad he’ll settle for the treadmill.

He likes to get an hour of cardio in before he heads to the gym. A recent Monday workout included shoulder and back workouts. The next day targeted his legs and chest.

The 56-year-old jockey lives in Carlsbad, California, and keeps the same schedule nearly every day, working out in the morning before running some errands on a day off, or heading to the track to work with some horses in the afternoon.

“I work harder on my off days than on days I actually have to use my fitness,” Smith said.

The Hall of Famer has been dedicated to the gym since becoming a jockey in 1982 in New Mexico. He’s won 5,649 races in 34,051 starts, good for more than $339 million in career earnings.

The thousands of dollars he pours into his fitness each year has been worth it.

“If you ain’t taking care of your body, man, it’s a machine,” he said, and it will break down.

Then there’s Joe Bravo.

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“I’m not in the gym because I like it,” Bravo said with a laugh recently. “I love my job, so that’s the only reason I’m in the gym.”

Bravo and Smith are two elder statesmen in a physically demanding and sometimes dangerous sport that features jockeys as young as 18, which is increasingly adopting better fitness and eating habits to stay competitive and safe.

The list of injuries each jockey has suffered is as long as the track at Churchill Downs.

Bravo said he’s broken both collar bones, several ribs, his wrist and had a rod and screw inserted in his left leg after fracturing it. At 50, he still wakes up feeling great each morning but said he tells friends he’ll keep riding until his next serious injury because the rehab is worse than the training.

“It could be tomorrow, it could be 10 years from now,” he said.

Smith has broken his collar bones, shoulder, arms, “cracked” a leg and fractured his T12 and L3 vertebrae in his back in 1998. Smith said if he hadn’t been in “incredible shape” when he broke his back he might’ve been paralyzed. Instead, he was in the intensive care unit for a month before starting physical therapy — he only missed a year of racing. He has no intentions of calling his career quits any time soon.

Bravo said the industry has changed, too.

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It wasn’t uncommon for him to walk into a bathroom with a couple jockeys “flipping,” or throwing up their meal. Bulimia isn’t as prominent among riders now, Bravo said, and younger jockeys have better information about how to maintain their weight and eat better.

When Smith first started competing 40 years ago, he said older jockeys thought too much muscle was a detriment. He was the outlier.

“You didn’t used to see (jockeys at the gym at all) at all,” Smith said.

That’s not the case now. Smith sees five jockeys in his gym regularly. To compete against those in their 20s, 30s and 40s with their own workout regimens, Smith and Bravo have to keep up.

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Core workouts are a focal point for both jockeys. “You use a lot of your legs, your core and your lats” when riding, Smith said.

Bravo, 50, a New Jersey native who still has a home in the Garden State with his own gym equipment, estimates he spends $100 for two to three gym sessions per week at Equinox in Pasadena, California, where he also lives. He mostly does Pilates, which focuses on core stability, flexibility and strength. At 5-foot-1, about 113 pounds, Bravo isn’t one to throw up “200 pounds on the rack” to prove his strength.

“Every time I work out with a new trainer … I tell them I’ve broken my back four times,” he said. “So I focus on my core.”

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Smith said he pays $1,500 for 20 sessions and goes up to six times a week to Foothill Physique in Monrovia, California, and another place in Del Mar. At 5-foot-4 and anywhere from 118 to 120 pounds, Smith used to max out at 245 pounds on his bench press in his 20s, he said. But as he’s gotten older he’s focused less on max weight and more on repetition.

Neither races as much as they used to, but they both said they feel great. Bravo said he would ride in 10-15 races some days in his 20s at tracks in Philadelphia during the day and Atlantic City, New Jersey, at night. Now, he rides in up to five races a day Friday, Saturday and Sunday during the racing season and rests and trains the rest of the week.

Bravo’s diet has also evolved as he’s grown older.

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“Blessed” to be shorter than other riders, Bravo loved that he could down a cheeseburger in his 20s when he was typically lighter than most jockeys. He still eats burgers and enjoys lasagna or pasta on his cheat days, but he eats more chicken and fish now to maintain his riding weight.

Smith can’t say no to a good bowl of cereal for a nightly snack — he swears by the odd combination of Fruity Pebbles and marshmallows — but he tries to eat healthy each day, especially during his main meal.

All the attention to their fitness and diet prepares them for races that last just two minutes. Smith, who will ride Taiba on May 7 in the 148th Kentucky Derby, said his workouts are harder than the average race, but nothing tops the Derby.

“You can ride mile-and-a-quarters all year long,” Smith said, "and it’s not like riding (the Derby).”