Tom Ryan will be after more feature jumps race success at Sandown on Saturday when he rides Megapixel in The Australian Steeplechase and Kirribilli Gold in The Australian Hurdle.
The 27-year-old Irish jumps jockey was virtually unknown when he landed his first Australian win aboard 50-1 shot Man Of Class in last year’s Grand National Steeple at Sandown.
Ryan rode more than 100 winners in Ireland and England, his biggest win being at the 2006 Cheltenham Jumping Festival.
“I’ve been here a year and a half now,” he said.
“I came here with the Irish team a couple of years ago and loved the place.
“I always said if I got the chance I’d come back and obviously with the downturn of the economy at home racing took a hard hit and I said now is my chance to go so I boarded a plane and headed to Australia.”
Ryan, who combines riding over the jumps with working for Flemington trainer Russell Cameron, has already come under notice this season with his win on Fareer in the Brierly Steeple at Warrnambool on May 1.
And he’s happy to pick up any scraps that his mate, local champion jumps jockey Steve Pateman, leaves him.
Pateman, whose services are in great demand, has been riding both the Bill and Symon Wilde-trained Megapixel and Kirribilli Gold, prepared by Robert Smerdon.
But Ryan is the recipient of those mounts as Pateman has elected to ride the Smerdon-trained Fareer and Palmero, prepared by Ciaron Maher, in the Steeple and Hurdle respectively on Saturday.
When Pateman elected to ride Megapixel in the Brierly, he recommended Ryan to Smerdon who engaged him for Fareer.
Ironically Fareer relegated Pateman’s mount Megapixel to second place in the Brierly and it was the same in last year’s Grand National Steeple when Pateman was a narrowly beaten runner-up aboard the favourite Kerdem.
Pateman was back aboard Fareer when he was runner-up to Al Karam in the Great Southern Steeple at Mornington on May 20.
Pateman rode grey mare Kirribilli Gold when she won her only start over jumps by 10 lengths in a maiden hurdle at Warrnambool on May 1.
