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Chavez picks up bonus ride in Dubai |
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Michael Lee |
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Jockey Oscar Chavez will now get two leading chances to show his
wares at his very first stint in As the regular partners of Ip Man and Captain Obvious
respectively, Chavez and Woodworth were quite logically booked by trainer
Steven Burridge to take the ride at those two gallopers¡¯ But after Woodworth took a tumble aboard Burridge¡¯s Bull And
Bear around the last bend in the $55,000 Class 4 race over 1400m on Sunday
and dislocating his shoulder, Burridge had to quickly find a replacement on
Captain Obvious, who is entered in a 1200m race on the All-Weather track at
Meydan on Friday.
It came as little surprise that Chavez, who flew out to the
Emirates alone on Tuesday, was the one who got the nod, though Burridge could
have considered other available jockeys in Dubai, such as Irish jockey Ted
Durcan who rode Dark Matter to victory and Apache Crown to a fourth place at
Burridge¡¯s Dubai baptism of fire on January 12. ¡°I was going there to ride Ip Man and now I¡¯ll ride Captain
Obvious too!¡± said Chavez. ¡°I feel sorry for Benny who is a good friend of
mine, but that¡¯s racing. ¡°I¡¯ve never ridden in Chavez has never ridden the former Malaysian-based Captain
Obvious at any of his 21 starts on either side of the Causeway, but Burridge
has no doubt the experienced Panamanian rider would acquit himself well on
the bold grey six-year-old by Verglas. ¡°It¡¯s a pity Benny won¡¯t be able to ride Captain Obvious in ¡°He¡¯s a jump-and-run type of horse and I¡¯m sure Oscar won¡¯t have
any problems with him. He¡¯s weighted at 58kg but it¡¯s not too bad as the
bottom weight is down at 53kg.¡± The next day, Chavez will then jump aboard Ip Man, a horse he
has been associated with throughout his four starts for both Burridge and his
previous handler David Kok. A two-time winner over 1000m and 1200m, the Mr Nancho
three-year-old will race in a 1400m race on the All-Weather track on Saturday
and has been handicapped at 55kg. ¡°It¡¯s hard to assess the form at this stage as the declarations
are not out yet, but I hope they can run as well as Dark Matter and Apache
Crown,¡± said Burridge. ¡°All four horses took a while to settle in but Thursday¡¯s races
were a good indication they can measure up, especially Dark Matter who ran
true to his ¡°It¡¯s been a learning curve for them and those first races were
important as they were like stepping stones and would tell us where they go
from here.¡± Burridge said his two debut runners have both pulled up well and
are slated to run next week. ¡°I wanted to keep two weeks between runs. They¡¯re both running
next Thursday (January 27),¡± said Burridge. ¡°I haven¡¯t decided who will ride. It could be Ted again, I¡¯m not
sure. It all depends. ¡°One thing¡¯s for sure it won¡¯t be Oscar. He¡¯s only riding these
two this weekend and is going back to ¡°I myself am coming back to The 2010 ¡°Julie¡¯s done an amazing job back home. It¡¯s a lot of hard work
to handle it all by herself but it¡¯s worked out good,¡± said Burridge proudly. ¡°That Friday winner (Shuttle Man) is pretty exciting and it was
also good to see One More Minute win first-up. ¡°He¡¯s shown form over the mile and it was a good effort to score
first-up over 1200m.¡± |
