DUBBO rider Greg Ryan has been honoured with the Country Jockey Of the Year award presented at a gala dinner held in Sydney on Friday night.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Ryan won the award in front of Grafton based Glenn Lynch and Robert Thompson from Newcastle.
The awards have been running for 10 years and this honour was Ryan’s eighth which recognised his amazing riding achievements during the past decade.
Ryan’s wife and racing manager, Pauline, said the dinner was a wonderful gathering of racing people who were there to see the best honoured.
“It’s always nice for Greg to win these awards and he was pleased,” she said.
“We had a good representation from the western area at the dinner including Colleen and Peter Dwyer who are part owners of Izababe which unfortunately missed out on the Country Horse of the Year award.
“Colleen and Max Walker were there from Mudgee and Ann Hall, was there from Western Racing along with John and Kate Smith.”
The awards dinner brv ought to an end a week’s R and R for Greg and Pauline Ryan. The jockey was suspended for a week for causing interference at the Dubbo Gold Cup meeting and spent his time off the scene on a family holiday down the South Coast.
And from all reports he is now the owner of a new motorbike to idle away any spare time he does have off from the racing scene.
But it’s back to business this week with rides booked for Muswellbrook (Sunday) and at the Bathurst TAB meeting on Wednesday.
Unfortunately for other racing participants, Ryan was the only winner from the Central Districts and Western racing associations, despite having nominations in various categories.
The Peter Nestor-trained Izababe, last year’s Dubbo Gold Cup winner, was nominated for Country Horse of the Year, along with Border Rebel, Jest Cewsin’ and the eventual winner Karuta Queen.
Trained by Neville Layt at Queanbeyan, the three-year-old Karuta Queen boasts a career record of four wins from eight starts and two placings and has won more than $1.5 million in prize money.
Mudgee Race Club was a nominee for Country TAB club, won by Scone; while Brewarrina Jockey Club missed out on the Community Race Club Award; and Cobar Miners Race Club was a nominee for Outstanding Achievement Award.
