ORMAN ON THE CUSP OF JOINING AN ELITE CLUB

By Graham Potter | Saturday, July 1, 2023

On June 30, 2012, jockey Chris Munce displayed a real swagger in the saddle as he stood up high in the irons and waved his whip in an exaggerated salute as he piloted the late Kelso Wood trained Belltone towards the line and a decisive victory in the Glasshouse Handicap.

There was every reason to celebrate … certainly much more than most … as that victory wrote Munce’s name indelibly into the record books as the first jockey to ride one hundred metropolitan winners in a season in Queensland, having overtaken the previous, thirty-two-year-old record of Mick Dittman who recorded 97.5 winners during the 1979-80 season.

Munce’s record, which ultimately stood at 103 winners, lasted five years before ‘The Guv’, Jeff LLoyd came and smashed that out of the park with an incredible haul of 137 winners in the 2016/17 season … and for good measure he topped the ton in the next season as well notching 106 winners, achieveing these totals in the middle two years of his four season premiership reign.

So, in the history of Queensland racing, the ‘ton up’ club has only two members, Chris Munce, as stated the first to achieve the feat, and Jeff Lloyd, the first rider to do it twice … meaning that, apart from the rarified stratosphere they have reached, they have both put their own unique claim to fame on the scoreboard.

But now, with a touch of symmetary five years again after Lloyd last claimed one hundred winners, there is a knock at the door.

Jimmy Orman could be on his way in.

With 98 metropolitan winners currently behind his name Orman has a very real chance of carrying his total to that magical 100 figure at Saturday’s Sunshine Coast meeting … at the exact same meeting where Munce scored that historic win aboard Belltone … and Orman will set a record of his own should he breakthrough and breach that barrier as he will become the youngest member to join that elite club … the youngest member by far.

Munce was in his early forties when he landed the hundred wins while Lloyd was already in his mid-fifties when he claimed his unique double.

Orman is only in his mid twenties..

Orman still has to get there, of course, and the fine line that jockey’s walk between safety and glory was again emphasized in the sixth race at the Ipswich meeting on Friday where the starter released the runners with Orman not seated in the saddle of his mount, who left the starting gates riderless.

Two other runners were deemed to have been disadvantaged by the premature release of the field from the starting gates which resulted in all three of the horses involved being declared as non-runners, but, thankfully, nobody was injured in the incident.

It is a very fine line between success and disaster.

So, there we have it.

The first person to do it. The first person to do it twice and ... still pending ... the youngest person to do it

As with horses from different eras, any comparison is a moot point, but there are always those will want to do that.

For the record, when Lloyd rode his 137 winners, they came from 656 rides at a sparkling win strike rate of 20.9 percent. The season he rode 106 winners … that came from only 464 rides at a winning strike rate of 22.8 percent.

When Munce finished his ‘hundred-up’ season, his 103 wins came from 527 rides at a winning strike rate of 19.5 percent.

Jimmy Orman currently boasts a winning strike rate of 18.5 percent with the 98 metropolitan winners he has clocked up to date coming from 530 rides.

Whichever way you look at it, all have super quality statistics.

Whether it is Saturday … or another day soon … the hope is there that Orman will not take long in cementing his place in the history of the Queensland riding ranks by ticking off metropolitan win number 100.

As would surely become obvious by now, it would be quite a remarkable achievement and worthy of the highest praise.

*Statistics sourced from the official Racing Queensland website

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