Jeff Lloyd
Veteran jockey Jeff Lloyd was in sparkling form at Eagle Farm race track on Saturday, 17 September 2016, making the most of a strong book of rides to land five winners from 9 rides on the afternoon’s card in his best performance since relocating to Australia.
Lloyd joins an elite band of jockeys to have achieved 5 winners in a day at a Queensland city meeting, alongside Bill Briscoe, Graham Cook, Jim Byrne, Gavan Duffy, Len Hill, Russel Maddock, Mike Pelling, Ivan Wernowski and Brian York. However, Mick Dittman still holds the record for six winners on a card, which he achieved at Eagle Farm on 1 November 1977.
Earlier in the week, Lloyd politely requested a number of tickets from the Brisbane Racing Club hinting that he was expecting a good afternoon, but commented afterwards, “Sometimes you can have good books on paper, but it needs to pan out and I’m pleased it did.”
“I rode seven winners in a day three times in South Africa, but this is the first time I’ve ridden five in Australia,” Lloyd said. “You never get bored of winning! You’re always a chance when you have the rides. I had a couple of friends who own horses from back in South Africa who wanted to come, so I picked a good day to do it.”
“I thought coming here that Monsieur Gustave and Bound For Love would be very hard to beat and I just hoped a few of the others fell into place and fortunately they did.”
In addition to the two he labelled, Lloyd also won on Balboa Rocks, One Inch Punch and Man Of His Word.
“It is good have days like this but a lot of hard work by a lot of people goes into it,” said Lloyd.
The South African was out of the saddle for a year after suffering a stroke in March 2013, but made a full comeback and showed he is as competitive as ever, etching his name in the Australian record books for the 2015/16 season as the oldest jockey to win the Brisbane metropolitan jockeys’ premiership at the age of 54.
