N A week's time, Luke Nolen's face may well be broadcast around the globe as the rider of the world's fastest horse, Black Caviar, following her run in the Diamond Jubilee Stakes at Royal Ascot in front of Queen Elizabeth, reports The Age.com.auIt says: But the jockey insists few people will even notice him. ''They don't look at me,'' he said yesterday. ''They just see that black jet underneath me.''For a man entrusted with the job of stretching the unbeaten Black Caviar's record to 22 wins on p
N A week's time, Luke Nolen's face may well be broadcast around the globe as the rider of the world's fastest horse, Black Caviar, following her run in the Diamond Jubilee Stakes at Royal Ascot in front of Queen Elizabeth, reports The Age.com.au
It says: But the jockey insists few people will even notice him. ''They don't look at me,'' he said yesterday. ''They just see that black jet underneath me.''
For a man entrusted with the job of stretching the unbeaten Black Caviar's record to 22 wins on possibly thoroughbred racing's biggest stage at the annual five-day royal carnival, Nolen is notably relaxed.
Yesterday, at his final local press conference before he leaves for England tonight following the Flemington meeting, the 32-year-old refused to claim credit for Black Caviar's remarkable rise. He claimed the plaudits that would come if she was to win in England would belong mostly to the mare and partly to her trainer Peter Moody and his assistants.
''I am just part of the show,'' he said. ''She's the story. I'm just the lucky bloke that sits on top of her. I don't kid myself for a moment that no other jockey could do the same job that I've done on her.'' But he conceded that he enjoyed more than a simple jockey-horse relationship with the mighty mare. ''I am married so I know how to get along with ladies most of the time. I don't upset her and we get along fine as a result.''
So calm is Nolen on the eve of such a history-making venture, he said he had not yet thought of what might be in front of him at Royal Ascot next Saturday: the tension before the race, the pressure during it and the post-race burden of explaining a ground-breaking victory or an unthinkable loss.