Jockeys

Nowadays, the historic National Hunt Challenge Cup Chase, which was inaugurated in 1860, is run over 3 miles, 5 furlongs and 201 yards on the Old Course at Cheltenham, having been shortened from its previous distance of 3 miles, 7 furlongs and 147 yards in 2020. The traditional ‘four miler’ remains an amateur riders’ novices chase and, since 2017, has held Grade 2 status, but the qualifying criteria for horses and jockeys are stricter than was once the case.

Anyway, the jockeys who finished first and second in the 2010 renewal of the National Hunt Chase were two pioneering Irish horsewomen who, between them, really raised the bar for the achievements of women in the saddle, at the Cheltenham Festival and elsewhere. The winner on that occasion was Poker De Sivola, trained by Ferdy Murphy and ridden by Katie Walsh, who took the lead, under strong pressure, shortly after the final fence and stayed on to beat Becauseicouldntsee, trained by Noel Glynn and ridden by Nina Carberry, by 2¼ lengths. Two years later, in February, 2012, Nina Carberry became sister-in-law to Katie Walsh when she married her brother, Ted Walsh Jr..

Poker De Sivola was, in fact, a first Cheltenham Festival winner for Katie Walsh, but she would go on to ride two more, Thousand Stars, trained by Willie Mullins, in the County Hurdle later that same week and Relegate, also trained by the Closutton maestro, in the Champion Bumper eight years later. Nina Carberry, who is the daughter of Grand National-winning jockey Tommy Carberry, was a rather more regular to the winners’ enclosure at the Cheltenham Festival, winning the Cross Country Chase four times, the Foxhunter Chase twice and the Fred Winter Juvenile Novices’ Handicap Hurdle once; she remains the most successful female jockey in the history of the Festival.

On September 8, 2023, as reported in the ‘Racing Post’, Billy Loughnane rode Lambert, trained by George Boughey, to a comfortable victory in a novice stakes race at Kempton, taking his career total to 95 and thereby riding out his remaining 3lb claim. Loughnane, who only turned 17 on March 2, 2023, had his first ride in public on Starfighter, trained by his father, Mark, at Newcastle on October 24, 2022, and rode his first winner, Swiss Rowe, also trained by Loughnane Snr., at a fog-bound Wolverhampton on November 28, 2022.

‘Billy The Kid’ joined the senior ranks just over nine months later, a feat made all the remarkable for the fact that he spent a few weeks in the United States riding work for Anna Meah, whose husband David is a friend of his father, in February, 2023, and a few more on the sidelines, having suffered a fractured thumb in a stalls incident at Nottingham on July 21, 2023. Loughnane broke through, in dramatic fashion, in early 2023, riding 23 winners in January, 11 more in March, following his Stateside sabbatical, and being crowned champion all-weather apprentice, with a total of 41 winners, at the All-Weather Vase meeting at Lingfield Park, on April 7, 2023.

At the last count, the rising star of the weighing room had ridden a total of 89 winners in 2023, so far, 16 of which were saddled by his father. Since the start of the apprentice jockeys’ championship on May 6, 2023, he has, at the time of writing, ridden 44 winners, giving him a lead of 12 over his nearest rival, defending champion Benoit de la Sayette, with 40 days left until British Champions Day at Ascot on October 21, 2023.

The late John Thomas ‘J.T.’ McNamara, who died at his home in County Limerick on July 26, 2016, at the age of 41, was one of the finest amateur jockeys in the history of National Hunt racing. On March 14, 2013, McNamara suffered a calamitous injury when his mount, Galaxy Rock, fell at the first fence in the Fulke Walwyn Kim Muir Challenge Cup at the Cheltenham Festival. He fractured the C3 and C4 vertebrae in his neck, which led to him being placed into a medically-induced coma and left him paralysed from the neck down. Three years later, he suffered complications arising from the injury, which ultimately led to his untimely death.

Although officially an ‘amateur’, McNamara blurred the lines between the unpaid and paid ranks. Indeed, at the time of his death, Tony McCoy, the most successful jump jockey in the history of National Hunt racing, said of McNamara, ‘He was every bit as experienced as me and probably as talented as I am.’ One reason the Limerick man chose not to turn professional, although eminently talented enough, was that to do so would require wasting below his natural body weight of 10st 7lb or thereabouts.

Nevertheless, according to Horse Racing Ireland (HRI), McNamara rode 602 winners in the point-to-point sphere, but plenty more under Rules at home and abroad. He was a particularly potent force at Cheltenham, where he rode 16 winners from 64 rides, at a strike rate of 24%, and over £350,000 in prize money. At the Cheltenham Festival, he won the National Hunt Chase twice, on the enigmatic Rith Dubh, trained by Jonjo O’Neill, in 2002, and Teaforthree, trained by Rebecca Curtis, in 2012, the Cross Country Chase on Spotthedifference, trained by Enda Bolger, in 2005 and the Foxhunter Chase on Drombeag, also trained by O’Neill, in 2007. All bar Teaforthree were owned by John Patrick ‘J.P.’ McManus.