Unlikely Duo Making The Most Of Their Golden Run

Sydney Morning Herald

Friday September 1, 2006

ANDREW STEVENSON

FOR the past eight or nine years, jockey Glenn Lynch has been a Christmas guest at the Toowoomba home of trainer Ron Maund - but don't expect to see them breaking bread when they come to the big smoke this weekend.

They're still friends: it's just that old jockeys and young horses can be a tough double act.

Lynch, 34, who came back from holidays weighing a padded 64 kilograms, has one of the biggest rides of his late-blooming career at Rosehill on Saturday.

Lynch has the mount on Gold Edition, the pick of the fillies in the $1 million Golden Rose. Well he does if he keeps his mouth shut between now and then, with Gold Edition carrying only 53.5kg in the set-weights 1400-metre race.

On his way down to fighting weight, Lynch admitted he still had a way to go. "I'm probably about 57kg at the moment but I'm going to be a bit lighter come Saturday," he promised, saying he was more worried about Maund's weight than his own.

There's a big difference, says Maund. "I haven't got to make the weight on Saturday: he has to or he's replaced."

And, anyway, says Maund, the jockey's concern for the trainer extends only so far. "He'd be worried if I was in hospital or on life support. He'd have lost his meal ticket," he jokes.

Friends for years, Maund and Lynch have struck success of late with a string of good young horses, especially Gold Edition, which has seven wins from 14 starts. Maund also has Pure Energy, runner-up in this year's Golden Slipper, and has Street Smart and Ice Chariot eyeing the Victorian spring carnival.

It's taken a while. "Even though I had a bit of luck when I was younger, probably we're a couple of late bloomers," observes Maund. "I've been having a much better run since I was 60."

Lynch was apprenticed as a jumps jockey in New Zealand, spent a year breaking horses in Japan and battled around on the Darling Downs before the breaks coming his way stopped being ankles, wrists and legs. He didn't really get serious about flat racing until he was 26, but there were still hurdles.

"I've always believed I could make it but you've got to get the support and it's harder when you're camped up somewhere like Toowoomba," Lynch explains.

"You might get offered a ride or two on a Saturday to go down to Brisbane but you've got to weigh it up - are they a winning chance? Otherwise you can forfeit a full book of rides at Toowoomba and, at the end of the day, you've got to make money.

"But the last couple of years I've thought, 'Bugger it, I'm going to follow these horses around and give myself the best chance to see how far I can go'."

Taking his time might offer an insight into the success that eventually came his way - Lynch won his first group 1, the Queensland Derby on Ice Chariot, only two months ago.

"Most flat jockeys, they can be good race day but they're not real good horsemen," he says. "Some of them are but to be a good jumps jockey [involves] a lot more communication with the horse.

"You've got to get the horse to do the best they can and really work in with them. With those good horses I'm riding now I've spent a lot of time from day one when they came to trackwork. It takes time to educate them, teach them balance."

Lynch has been aboard Gold Edition for all her races and most of her trackwork. "I can just look in her eye and I just know how she'll go," he says.

"When I got down to the barriers the other day for the start [of the Silver Shadow Stakes] I knew it was all over. It's just the little personality things, how they're looking, their coat and how bright they are. But she's a very tough filly and it reflects in her racing."

Success is only making Lynch a better rider, his confidence growing. "Once you get a taste for it - the success and the extra money that rolls in - you really strive for it," he says. "But it's not only that. When you're scraping by each week, just making wages, it's hard when you get on something that's half handy because you get excited and think, 'I might win this' and you might stuff it up.

"When you don't have any money worries you're a lot more laid back and you tend to make the right choices. There's no pressure and that goes on to the horse as well. If you're nervous they can feel from the way you're riding."

Lynch says nerves didn't get the better of him when he rode in his first Golden Slipper - but it was his worst ride for Maund, and the trainer was quoted saying the jockey rode her like "a pox doctor's clerk".

"He reckons he never said that. I said, 'You wouldn't have wanted to because you'll be riding the bloody thing yourself, next time. And trackwork'," says Lynch, who blames a "suicide alley", barrier 15.

Yet Lynch admits it was his worst ride for Maund. "It's easy to ride them afterwards - and it's easy to ride from the grandstand like most trainers do - especially ones who might have ridden a little bit earlier on and had injuries or weight problems," he says.

"They've got to realise we have to put up with that - and the pressure from them as well. You'll find most trainers get fat - especially Ron. He's not shy of a feed."

A win on Saturday would be a boon for the pair. Don't worry if it's not rated like a good race yet. "If they do make this race a group 1 we can just change the photo on the wall ourselves," says Lynch.

And maybe have a slap-up meal. But not too many, with Lynch eyeing his dream of a Melbourne Cup campaign with Ice Chariot. "I don't know what weight it would be - maybe 52, or 51.5kg. I'm just trying to work out which arm I really need," laughs Lynch.

© 2006 Sydney Morning Herald

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