Lucky break makes for dream Rioch ride
Racy Girls a hit
IRISH JUMPS jockey Niall Quinn could hardly believe his luck when a last-minute crash saw him land the ride on the country’s most spectacular steeplechaser Rioch.
Quinn, 21, came to Te Rapa yesterday with memories of having broken his back when falling on the course in the final race of the jumps season last September.
But yesterday it was Hastings rider Shaun Fannin who met misfortune, crashing from Varnish at the first fence of the first race.
Fannin, booked for Rioch in the Cambridge Steeplechase, broke his nose and suffered a suspected broken wrist, leaving trainer Kevin Myers with the problem of who to entrust with the mount.
For Rioch was not just any horse – the former champion jumper was coming back from yet another tendon injury and yesterday’s race was a crucial conditioner for next month’s Grand National Steeplechase at Riccarton.
But Myers, renowned for giving unheralded youngsters their chance, plumped for the Irish lad, who has worked for his Waverley operation for the past 17 months.
‘‘I’d never sat on him before,’’ said Quinn. ‘‘The closest I’d been was leading him round the birdcage once.’’
Quinn said the only advice Myers gave him was ‘‘try to stay on board.’’
Stay on board he did, a job that Quinn said was dead easy after he led all the way to score by 20 lengths.
‘‘Anybody could ride this horse,’’ Quinn said. ‘‘I was just a passenger.’’
Quinn said he’d never ridden a horse as good as Rioch, who made lengths on his rivals at almost every fence.
There was hardly a person Quinn didn’t want to thank for the opportunities he’s had here – an unknown boy from County Down near Belfast who had no family connections to racing in Ireland when he decided to come to New Zealand, largely because he could get a visa in 24 hours.
‘‘I’m riding 10 years ahead of where I’d have been if I’d tried to ride in Ireland. You wouldn’t get on a horse like Rioch in Ireland.
‘‘But here they’re not afraid to give you a chance.’’
Had it not been for trainers such as Myers and Bill Thurlow, Quinn said he would have been on a plane home long ago.
But after he fractured two vertebrae in his lower back last September, he said he couldn’t have sat in the plane home anyway.
It took three months of rehab before he could get back into it – and luckily doctors didn’t tell him he shouldn’t ride again ‘‘because I wouldn’t have listened to them anyway.’’
Quinn wouldn’t have known it because Rioch’s owners weren’t at Te Rapa yesterday but the win, his fourth of the season, gave the O’Leary brothers a huge thrill.
Dan O’Leary, at New Plymouth watching another of his horses, described the joy of watching such a spectacular leaper, despite knowing they had to enjoy each race in case it was the last.
‘‘ He just outleapt them. He cleared some of the fences by a foot when they tried to chase him.
‘‘He’s looking pretty sound now but I suppose he’s still a day-today proposition,’’ O’Leary said.
‘‘ Each year something’s happened to him and he’s gone amiss.’’
O’Leary said the tendon and joint problems Rioch suffered during last year’s Koral Steeples at the national carnival weren’t as bad as the previous year.
‘‘He’s done both legs now but I had no doubt he would come sound again this time.’’
‘‘Kevin’s done a marvellous job. He’s done a lot of kilometres with him – he even went on a hunt last week.’’ THE ENTRIES poured in for our contest to win copies of the Racy Girls 2014 calendar.
Published by Zea Marks, it features 12 of our best riders in never-beforeseen poses, like the one above of Miss July, Danielle Johnson who, on 91 winners, is enjoying a career best season.
The calendar, available from www.racygirls2014.co.nz, will be launched at Cambridge Raceway’s Clubhouse Sports Bar and Grill on Sunday, August 3 when the jockeys will model their specially designed outfits with proceeds going to Leukaemia and Blood Cancer NZ.
Our winners are: S Branch, Hautapu Rd, Cambridge; Steve Norgate, Henderson St., Blenheim; Faye Rodger, Manuka St., Orewa; D Woodman, Amber Dr., Whangarei; David Cowan, Terrace St., Invercargill.