FORMER champion Bart Leisher has only to keep riding winners in South Africa to be odds-on for a Club jockey berth next season.
Leisher completed an amazing comeback to the saddle after his horrific fall at Sha Tin eight years ago when he rode a winner last week in Johannesburg, less than three weeks after being re-licensed by South African authorities.
The runaway Hong Kong champion jockey in 1988 immediately stressed that he would love to ride in the territory again.
Chief stipendiary steward Bernard Hargreaves, who is also acting director of racing in the absence of Philip Johnston in China, said yesterday: 'If Bart Leisher wants a Club licence next season for three months, or something like that, he would have to have a favourite's chance of getting it.
'I think anybody in racing, whether they knew him or not, would have to be delighted with his comeback. I can still see that terrible accident, it was one of those things you just never wish to have in racing but, unfortunately, they do happen.' Leisher satisfied South African authorities that he was fit to ride again after passing a stringent medical check.
'One has to immediately accept that no competent racing body would permit a jockey to ride again if they were not satisfied that he was indeed fit to do so.
