Irishman Will Gordon will step onto the Flemington track for the first time when he represents the Country Jockeys at the Rapid Racing meeting at Flemington.
Having seen the success of countrymen John Allen and Declan Bates, Gordon decided to give Victoria a try as a jumps jockey.
Gordon won last year’s Galleywood Hurdle at Warrnambool and had ridden his share of winners over the jumps since making the move.
But in the past two years, Gordon has also been trying his hand at flat racing, and this season sits second on the Country Jockeys’ Premiership, just four wins behind Allen who originally started out riding over jumps before he made the transition to the flat.
By sitting second on the Country Jockeys’ Premiership, Gordon rides for the country jockeys against the leading jockeys on the Metropolitan Championship in the third staging of the Rapid Racing on Friday.
All seven races on Friday’s card are on the straight course, something new to Gordon.
“I’m really looking forward to it. It’s something I’ve wanted to do since I started riding on the flat,” Gordon told RSN.
“It will be the first time I’ve set foot on the track. It will be a great experience to see it, it will be great to tick that one off the box and even better if we can get one up.”
Gordon does most of his riding on the country circuit and said he had been doing plenty of work in the early part of the season which was now starting to pay dividends.
While his flat career is starting to take off, Gordon said he cannot forget his jumping background and will switch to racing over obstacles when the season commences in March.
“That’s where I pretty much learnt to ride. It’s something I enjoy as well,” Gordon said.
“I’m not going to turn any win down, but there’s a lot of work that goes into jumps racing and you get that reward when you get a winner.”
Gordon has rides in six of the seven races on Friday with his best chance likely to be Hills, the $3.20 favourite with TAB, in the Silverpoint Homes Sprint for Will Clarken.