Riding on the back of success

The first time petite Justine King saw a horse, she could not believe how magnificent it was – and vowed then and there to become a jockey.

She knew she would be a woman in a man’s world, but having grown up with boys all her life, she decided, “If I can’t beat them, I might as well join them”.

Since becoming an apprentice at the South African Jockey Academy at Summerveld, outside Durban, she has indeed beaten them on the track, having notched up 17 wins to date.

Twenty-year-old King, now in her fifth and final year at the jockey academy, is just one of four female jockeys at the academy and one of two in the country who are racing.

Weighing in at just 42kg, we wondered how she managed to hold more than 400kg of thoroughbred strength.

“It was quite difficult at first, especially as I had never been on a horse and never even touched one. And the first time I got on top of a horse, I was really scared,” she said.

Justine King knows how to handle horses, Dynamite Mike (left) and Lebellos Spy  and makes a pretty good model too, with make-up by Gill Simpkins and a dress by Karen Monk-Klijnstra. Picture: Adrian Shields

Adrian Shields

The tiny apprentice has been thrown off a couple of times too.

But having been racing since the third year of her apprenticeship, she is proud of the times she has been first past the finishing post.

What do the male apprentice jockeys think of the girl apprentices?

“They don’t care whether we are females or not. They just see us as competition, because there is a lot of rivalry,” she said.

As there has never been a female jockey involved in the Vodacom Durban July, her dream is to become the first woman to compete in the big race at Greyville one day.

Stakes

Justine King gets mud on her face Picture: Gold Circle

Gold Circle

She won the fashion stakes at Summerveld last week, though, when Gill Simpkins, Gold Circle’s media manager, decided to do a pre-Vodacom Durban fashion shoot to go with this year’s theme, A Material World, which involves reinventing.

She felt King was the perfect choice for a model – and one who could handle the horses.

The picturesque row of oak trees and carpet of leaves at Summerveld provided the perfect backdrop as King – with make-up by Simpkins – swopped her racing silks for a high-class designer outfit by acclaimed Durban designer Karen Monk-Klijnstra.

“It was amazing. I have never been done up so well. It was all new to me,” the model jockey beamed.