ANNA Roper says she has made a good comeback to riding even though it took
longer than she had hoped.
With a promising career unfortunately dogged so far by injury and now well and truly on the up again, the talented Wyong apprentice made a belated start to the season and ridden nine winners including a maiden four-timer at the Gosford provincial meeting held at Port Macquarie on December 29 and a Taree double two days ago.
Last season’s Rising Star Series winner has the chance to put the seal on that “comeback” by winning the inaugural $500,000 Wyong Leagues Group The Lakes at her home track’s historic metropolitan stand-alone meeting on Saturday.
Roper, 22, rides lightweight chance Super Helpful ($14) for trainers Barb Joseph and sons Paul and Matt Jones, and is hoping for more rain to further bolster the Canberra gelding’s prospects.
The versatile and tough Super Helpful has won 11 races – three of them on soft ground and another three on the heavy.
Wyong today was rated a ‘Soft 6’, and the young jockey is looking forward to renewing
acquaintances with the six-year-old’s trainers.
“I’ve ridden a couple of winners for Barb and her sons, one of them being the start of my first ever metropolitan treble at Gosford in April last year,” Roper said this afternoon.
“That was Zouatica, who like Super Helpful, is good in the wet.”
The Lakes is a non-claiming race, and Roper will ride Super Helpful at his correct 52kg minimum.
That’s quite a difference from the 61.5kg the city winner carried in his defeat of Hollywood Hero and Associate in the Nowra Cup (1600m) on December 15.
Roper, having made a successful riding debut on Alpha Go at Gundagai in April 2022, has since tallied a further 139 winners.
It would inevitably have been more had she not spent nearly eight months sidelined with a serious right knee problem as a result of a freakish accident returning to the enclosure after a race at Muswellbrook in November that year.
Roper had ridden 56 winners at that stage; 42 of them in the first four months of the 2022-23 season had her leading the NSW apprentices’ premiership and in the Top 5 in the senior ranks.
Not long after clinching that maiden metropolitan treble (she also won on Bethencourt for Kim Waugh and Memoria for Kris Lees), she suffered a foot injury at Newcastle trials and again spent some time out of the saddle.
After scoring on Yendy for Ciaron Maher at Hawkesbury on July 21 last year, she underwent further surgery two days later, bowing out of the season with 74 winners.
Roper did not resume riding until early November and found winners were hard to come by.
She had ridden only one (Le Souci at Tuncurry on December 9) before she scored on Gosford trainer Kylie Gavenlock’s mare Audette (whom she will partner again at Saturday’s meeting) at Royal Randwick on Boxing Day.
More winners flowed; four at Port Macquarie on December 29, Tiwi Girl at the same track on
January 3, and then the Taree double last Tuesday.
“I can say now that I’ve made a successful comeback, but it’s definitely taken longer than I had hoped,” Roper said.
“It will be a big day on Saturday, my family will be there and it would be fantastic to get a winner or two, especially in the main race.”
Roper, apprenticed to Wyong trainer Damien Lane, has had only one previous ride in a $500,000 feature. That was The Four Pillars (1500m) at Rosehill Gardens on November 4, 2023 when she finished second on $12 chance Oakfield Waratah for fellow Wyong trainer Kristen Buchanan, beaten by then Newcastle apprentice Dylan Gibbons on Sweet Mercy ($19).
Including Super Helpful and another good wet tracker Audette (F&M Benchmark 78 Handicap, 1100m), she has seven bookings on the 10-race card.
The others are Pluckten for her boss Lane in the 3&4YO Benchmark 72 Handicap (1300m), Edmond (Kim Waugh), Nipotino (Danielle Seib), Hopeful (Annabel Neasham & Rob Archibald), and Skye Banner (Brett Partelle). Story by John Curtis, 9 January, 2025. Photo by Bradley Photos.
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