Jonathan’s a Star all right - that makes 800 winners for the former jumps jockey

Lincoln Star brought up a significant milestone for jockey Jonathan Riddell when he made an overdue return to winning form at Otaki today.

In registering his first win for nearly two years, Lincoln Farms’ six-year-old credited Riddell with the 800th winner of his career.

And Riddell, 42, achieved the feat in typical style, getting the best out of the little horse to down plunge horse Flying Surf by a neck in a driving finish to the line.

What makes Riddell’s feat even more remarkable is that while he started riding in the 1995-96 season, for the first half of his 25 years in the saddle he was solely a jumps jockey and became one of the few to successfully make the transition to the ranks of open flat jockeys.

Jonathan Riddell gets the best out of Lincoln Star with Flying Surf challenging hotly inside him. PHOTO: Peter Rubery/Race Images.He now boasts a record of having ridden 67 Group and Listed winners.

Ironically among his first black type winners was top mare Dating, the dam of today’s winner Lincoln Star.

Riddell’s first of four rides on the mare was a winning one when she took the Group III Taranaki Breeders Stakes in October, 2011. He also rode Dating when she finished third to Mufhasa in the Group I Captain Cook Stakes the same season.

And while Dating finished an unlucky fourth in the 2011 New Zealand Oaks at 2400 metres, all five of her wins were at shorter trips, three at 1600 metres, a trip Riddell believes could be Lincoln Star’s best.

Trainer Lisa Latta had been keen to step the Savabeel gelding up over ground at his next start but acknowledges his three wins now have been at 1550 metres, 1600 metres and 1650 metres. In three tries over 2100 metres he has managed two placings.

Latta said Lincoln Star had been too weak to fulfil his early promise and only now as a six-year-old had he strengthened.

Lincoln Star has a neck on his rivals at the post. PHOTO: Peter Rubery/Race Images.“He’s also only a little horse who needs things to go right for him.

“He was caught three wide today but Jonathan had cover and said he got a nice run.”

Latta said another factor which had seen the $180,000 yearling underperform - today’s win was only his third from 27 starts - was his dislike of many track conditions.

“His ideal conditions are dead to slow and that’s basically what he got today. He’s run round on quite a few heavy tracks and he can’t take too many runs on top of the ground either.”

Riddell, who recalled Dating also liked ground that was just off, rode a sweet race on Lincoln Star, getting him up handy from a wide barrier and lodging a claim early in the run home.

While hotly challenged by Flying Surf and O’Shannon late, Riddell always looked to have the race in safe keeping, Lincoln Star never flinching on his run to stop the clock at 1:40.34.

The win took his stake earnings for Lincoln Farms’ John and Lynne Street to $53,305. He paid $7.90 on the tote, a tidy return for a horse whom Latta labelled one of her top two of the day for Lincoln Farms.

Earlier in the day Riddell was also aboard Lincoln Raider who looked a good thing beaten after being bumped leaving the gates then badly squeezed up halfway down the straight when mounting his run. He finished fourth, just a length behind winner Skarloey, and only a short neck behind stablemate Platinum Rapper.