Eyeing up a winning ticket

Easter Monday 1998 and Tom Rudd, perched aboard Ontheroadagain, still hadn't ruled out his chance of winning the Jameson Irish Grand National. That is until the sixth last fence when Ontheroadagain went for a detour.

The horse fell heavily and while scraping the Fairyhouse muck off himself, Rudd felt a twinge. As ever, he thought it might be his collarbone.

"Whenever I fall on my shoulder I always think collarbone, and the thing is it's the one thing I've never broken," Rudd says with a grin. It's easy to grin now, but to describe the injury as "quite sore" is to make those of us locked to terra firma feel even more effete.

Rudd's left arm was broken, high up at the shoulder. Six weeks later and the rider climbed back into the saddle only for the exertion to pull the muscle from his shoulder to his arm clean away. Rudd was out of action for months in all.

If that was "quite sore", then another Fairyhouse fall last year qualifies, too, with possibly a "bizarre" thrown in.

"I was riding a horse for Gerry Lynch. Three strides from the fence and we were set, two strides from the fence we were fine, and at one stride she stopped. I went flying and the first part of me to hit the board at the front of the fence was my heels. I fractured them both," Rudd remembers.

Even for a member of a profession where broken bones are a matter of when and not if, it's a particularly poor catalogue of luck, but Rudd would have it no other way. Play and you pay.

A graduate of the North Tipperary and Ormond Pony Club, which also honed the young talents of Walter Swinburn, Charlie Swan and Shane Broderick, Rudd left Wilson's Hospital school in Mullingar without sitting an exam to pursue a riding career.

The riding bug had bitten deeply and parental disapproval could hardly have carried much weight considering father David learned to ride at 45 and spent five, ultimately fruitless, years trying to win a point to point.

Nine winners as a flat jockey, when apprenticed to Donald Swan, were followed by a winner on his first ride over the jumps at Exeter during a one-year stint in Britain. Any impression that the game was easy was quickly dispelled and a total of 12 winners this season seems to confirm Rudd's status in the middle order of the jockeys' batting.

But a major winner has a habit of changing perceptions. Consider the swings and roundabouts theory and it's reasonable to expect that Fairyhouse owes the 27-year-old jockey. The good news from those enigmatic owls who think handicapping horses is a fun thing to do is that payment could easily be upcoming in Monday's Irish National.

Glebe Lad, a four-year younger half-brother to Ontheroadagain, could be one of those treasured beasts that will carry a fraction of the weight than his talent might deserve. More than most races, the National demands such credentials. Glebe Lad has the look of a horse prepared specifically for the race and, like his brother, he may feel he owes his rider a good turn.

Almost a month ago at Leopardstown, Glebe Lad's third placing in a handicap chase saw Rudd return to a less than happy reception.

"I probably should have won but it was a Mickey Mouse race that turned into a sprint. I was seven lengths down at the second last and I gave him too much to do," he says. "The punters weren't too happy. They purposely came down to the third place marker to give me stick. That kind of thing gets you down a bit, but these things do happen."

IN A GAME where a riproaring, whip-flailing finish is always going to be more eye-catching than stylish finesse out in the country, Rudd can be an easy target for the grandstand jockeys. Admittedly he is no Pat Eddery in a scrap, but he clearly is good enough for Glebe Lad's trainer Michael O'Brien, who is generally acknowledged within the game as being no sufferer of fools.

One colleague of Rudd's in the weighroom says: "Tom may not be the strongest, but you'll see a lot worse and he has got on very well with Michael who wouldn't be my cup of tea to work for."

Rudd, who has ridden for O'Brien for four years, is understandably more diplomatic. "He's a critical man to ride for but fair. That's his job. He trains them and he expects his jockey to get it right, to do the job," he says.

O'Brien has proved he can get the Irish National right with wins by Vanton (1992) and King Spruce (1982). Glebe Lad looks a similarly dour, staying type.

"He's been a funny horse in that it has taken him time to jump right. He can be brilliant, but he has been inclined to make one stupid mistake in a race. Like in the Thyestes, he met the fence long, got his front legs up, but not the back ones and bang. Possibly he is not the brightest, but he has been doing some showjumping and that Leopardstown race, because they were going so slowly, forced him to be clever," Rudd says, who admits that he too thinks Glebe Lad holds a winning chance off his current handicap mark.

"It would be brilliant if he did. A good winner helps keep a jockey's name going. Most jockeys can get pissed off and say they don't want to do it any more and then a month later they are back. Riding good horses in good races is what it's all about. One must click some time. Mostly they don't but if one does click, you're on cloud nine," he says.

Rudd is entitled to believe Fairyhouse owes him a first class winning ticket to that cloud.