Racing: Kelsey Hannan keen to kick on with a premiership crack

Kelsey Hannan and Heart of Gold after her comeback win. Photo / Race Images

An injury that looks certain to rob Kelsey Hannan of the first big goal of her riding career has made her more determined to achieve it.

This time last season, the 19-year-old was an unheard-of apprentice with a few wins. Now she may be the most sought-after young jockey in the country.

Today at Te Rapa, she has a strong book, including Gospodin (R5, No 2), Librarsi (R3, No 7) and Sporting Chance (R1, No 6) as trainers look to cash in on her 2kg apprentice claim for a hoop who doesn’t ride like an apprentice.

Hannan emerged from obscurity to sit high on the jockeys’ premiership over summer, proving especially good at getting her mounts up and rolling to best take advantage of her claim.

But her breakout season came to a painful halt when she broke her wrist in a fall, missing 11 weeks riding until she returned last Saturday.

“Winning the apprentices’ premiership was my goal at the start of the season, and when I got injured, it only made me want it more,” Hannan told the Weekend Herald.

“So I’ve tried to stay fit, I even got a personal trainer, and have strengthened my wrist in the last month. I was a bit lucky because it was my right wrist I broke and I’m left-handed.

“I thought I might struggle for riding fitness but I’ve felt really comfortable coming back.”

Hannan was back last Saturday at Rotorua and back in the winners’ circle at Cambridge on Wednesday, so hasn’t taken long to signal her premiership intentions.

She sits five wins behind another of the emerging young stars on the saddle in Tayla Mitchell (55 wins), with last season’s champion apprentice Joe Kamaruddin on 52 wins in what looks a three-jockey race for the apprentice title.

“I’d love to win it, so I’m going to try to be as busy as I can. It was the main thing I thought about when I was injured,” says Hannan.

She rates Sporting Chance in today’s opener as her best ride, with the 4-year-old looking ready for the step up to 2100m when running on well over 1500m and 1560m at his last two starts.

The opening race will be special for Hannan for not only her apprentice title chase but the return to riding of her good friend Elen Nicholas after her promising career was also halted by a serious accident last year.

“Elen is being a huge part of my career [Nicholas is the partner of Hannan’s boss Shaun Phelan], so I’m thrilled she’s back out there, too,” says Hannan.

Five of today’s races, which will be held on a Te Rapa track which was a heavy9 yesterday, are qualifiers for the Winter Series, which gives the wet trackers a pot of gold at the end of the winter rainbows.

Away from New Zealand, the focus will be on Doomben in Brisbane, where Sakura Girl, Dragon Leap and the returning Dark Destroyer fly the New Zealand flag.

Sakura Girl is the $5 second favourite in the Doomben Roses but the O’Sullivan-Scott pair of Dragon Leap and Dark Destroyer are in for a greater challenge in the A$300,000 BRC Sprint, where fitness and wide draws are against them.