BLAKE Spriggs is excited to be coming “home!
The 32-year-old Group 1 winning jockey began his apprenticeship at Newcastle as a 16-year-old with trainer Steve Hodge, and has called a halt to a Brisbane sojourn after an enforced layoff through injury.
“I always knew I would come back to Newcastle,” he said.
“Though I was born at Canberra, the family moved to Newcastle when I was 5 or 6, and went to school and grew up there.
“With a young family now, it’s the right time to return home.
“I’ll ride at 55kg, and am prepared to travel everywhere just like Dad (Dale Spriggs) and RT (Robert Thompson) did during their great riding days.
“Unfortunately, I’ll miss Friday week’s Tamworth Cup meeting as we are coming back to
Newcastle that day because the residence we are moving in to not far from the track isn’t available until then.”
Spriggs has ridden 629 winners; the first of them at his debut on Sixty Watt for the late Newcastle trainer Phil Anderson at Muswellbrook on March 14, 2008.
He had not long transferred to Sydney when, apprenticed to Gai Waterhouse, he rode five winners at a Saturday meeting at Rosehill Gardens on July 17, 2010.
Spriggs’ Group 1 victory was achieved on Sir John Hawkwood in the 2016 The Metropolitan (2400m) at Royal Randwick during an association with the gelding’s owner Paul Fudge (Waratah Thoroughbreds) and Sydney trainer John Thompson.
He also rode Sir John Hawkwood in the Caulfield and Melbourne Cups that year, and had been narrowly beaten on him earlier that year in the Group 2 Brisbane Cup.
Spriggs relocated to Brisbane last September and rode eight winners, but has been sidelined since finishing third on Tambourine Man at the Sunshine Coast on December 10.
“I was injured two days earlier at Doomben on a horse called This Is The Ping, who bucked and hurt my left shoulder,” he explained.
“It was a frustrating injury because they couldn’t work out what the problem was until I saw a sports physician who looked after the Brisbane Lions AFL players.
“He discovered I had a bursae (a small sac filled with fluid) between my ribs and shoulder blade, and I didn’t have power in my left whip hand as I couldn’t roll my shoulder over.
“As a result, it took longer than expected to get it right, but it’s all good now.”
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Doncaster Mile winning jockey Tyler Schiller replaces Jason Collett on favorite Strait Acer in Sunday week’s $775,000 The Archer (1300m) at Rockhampton.
Collett won three races in succession on the talented Hawkesbury four-year-old in Sydney earlier in the season, and was to have partnered him in last Saturday’s $1m Provincial-Midway Championships Final (1400m) at Randwick when second to Territory Express, with Melbourne’s Mark Zahra aboard.
Collett was injured in a fall at Kembla Grange on April 9, and has also had to forfeit the ride on his Group 1 Sires winner Manaal in Saturday’s Group 1 Champagne Stakes (1400m) at Randwick.
He is expected to be out of action for several weeks with rib damage.
Story John Curtis, April 17, 2024 - Pics Billy Poulos
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