Blake Shinn is confident his roller-coaster ride back to the top of the jockey ranks will culminate in Cox Plate victory on Fiorente on Saturday.
Shinn, who won the mount on the Gai Waterhouse-trained six-year-old thanks to a carefully worded text to the trainer, has been restoring his reputation following a 12-month ban in 2010 for sustained gambling on horses.
”It’s very exciting, it’s a bit like being the first emergency on [AFL] grand final eve and getting the call-up, but I’ve certainly seen the other side of it, too,” Shinn said. ”I’ve been working really hard since I’ve come back because you have to earn that trust again and work your way back into the frame for good rides. The world doesn’t stop when you do.
”I’ve been riding work for Gai for about 18 months now and things have been going well. I’m starting to get a few more opportunities but this is clearly the best of them.”
Shinn is hungry for another major race win. It’s been five years since he rode Viewed to success in the Melbourne Cup.
One of the proudest people at Moonee Valley on Saturday if Shinn can ride Fiorente to victory will be Des O’Keeffe, his former manager. O’Keeffe has handled hundreds of jockeys and thousands of their problems, and he is hardened to their quirky ways. But he admitted Shinn was one of his favourites.
In early 2004, he took on the role of managing the strong-minded 17-year-old from Kilmore. ”This young man has a staggeringly strong competitive streak about him,” O’Keeffe said. ”In fact, you don’t see a young jockey ride so close to the line between suspension and staying within the rules.
”I managed him for 18 months and I got a remarkable insight into how Blake Shinn went about life as a future top jockey. He was manic about succeeding and having his body perfect for a career as a leading jockey. He kept his own counsel and had very few friends. He just wanted to leave no stone unturned at getting to the top.
”It may have been lack of maturity, I’m not sure, but when I was managing him I can honestly say he missed hundreds of winners due to going over that line, sort of pushing the envelope too far, and the stewards got sick of it.”
O’Keeffe said it had always concerned him Shinn was constantly putting pressure on himself. Just days after Shinn rode Demerger to win the Adelaide Cup of 2005 O’Keeffe became Victorian Jockeys Association chief executive and had to resign as Shinn’s manager.
”But I just watched his career from afar and I must say I wondered if he would make the grade in the long term,” he said. ”He had come from a family deeply involved in harness racing and then he became a successful jockey and both sports have a common thread in that they both evolved and exist from gambling.”
It emerged Shinn’s pressure valve was released by gambling. His 18-month disqualification for having an estimated 2031 bets totalling more than $580,000 on races over two years, devastated his former manager. ”I thought this is the last thing I could have imagined,” O’Keeffe said.
However, he knew Shinn would learn his lesson. ”Not one utterance about ‘why me’ or ‘poor me’. No, he said I have stuffed up and I’m going to confront it. What even made me feel better was that he was going to beat it, and trust me, when B Shinn looks you in the eye and says he will beat it, I am one who will never doubt him.”
