Veteran former top jockey turned trainer Gavin van Zyl has warned apprentice jockeys that they need to realise that it takes hard work to get rides.
Gavin Van Zyl – message for apprentices
The straightshooting Van Zyl was talking with refreshing candour after Raes’ Dyna Jet’s thrilling victory under Khanya Sakayi at Scottsville on Wednesday.
Sakayi is a 4kg claimer who has ridden twelve winners to date.
“Khanya is a hardworking guy and always full of smiles. I hire him and fire him and moan at him. He has had a hard time recently but he has the right attitude.”
The smiling Sakayi, who rode a cracker to outpoint the more senior Keagan De Melo in a tight finish, thanked Gavin van Zyl for the opportunity.
Khanya Sakayi – hard worker
“Mr van Zyl has tried to help me from the start but I was a bit green and things were tough,” admitted Sakayi.
Watch the top ride from Sakayi
Van Zyl said that he had given the third-year apprentice Jason Gates the ride originally but that the 18 year old had not made the effort or even pitched up to ride work.
“Young Gates went missing and never made the effort to come and ride work. These guys must learn that they have to get off their backsides and do the work. Gates will have to learn some lessons and hopefully get his head right,” he added.
A common thread in our interviews with trainers is that the modern day apprentices have it too easy and are glamourised and put on pedestals too early. That may well be the media’s doing, to some degree.
Veteran work-rider Peter Wrensch suggested in an interview last week that 70% of our jockeys riding today would not have made the grade in the Cape Hunt and Polo Club amateur ranks of 30 years ago.
