Tag: jockey

How many winners did Steve Smith-Eccles ride at the Cheltenham Festival?

Former National Hunt jockey Steve Smith-Eccles retired from race riding in 1994 and is best remembered for winning the Champion Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival three years running on See You Then, trained by Nicky Henderson, in 1985, 1986 and 1987. However, seven years prior to winning the two-mile championship for the first time, Smith-Eccles had already recorded his first victory at the Cheltenham Festival, when landing the RSA Insurance Novices’ Chase aboard Sweet Joe, trained by Harry Thomson ‘Tom’ Jones, in 1978.

Sweet Joe suffered a career-ending injury early in the 1978/79 season, but aside from a notable hat-trick in the Champion Hurdle, Smith-Eccles also won the Triumph Hurdle twice, in 1985 and 1987, the Grand Annual Chase in 1985 and the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle in 1986, for a career total of eight winners at the Cheltenham Festival. Six of those eight winners – First Bout (1985), See You Then (1985, 1986 and 1987) River Ceiriog (1986) and Alone Success (1987) – were trained by Nicky Henderson, at whom Smith-Eccles once threw a punch during an argument, while Alan Jarvis rowed in with Kathies Lad (1985). Indeed, the three winners Smith-Eccles rode at the 1985 Cheltenham Festival were sufficient to win him the leading jockey award for the one and only time.

Which was Harry Skelton’s first Cheltenham Festival winner?

Harry Skelton is the younger son of Olympic gold medal winning showjumper Nick Skelton and stable jockey to his older brother, Dan, at Lodge Hill, near Alcester, Warwickshire in the West Midlands. In 2018/19, Skelton Jnr. enjoyed far and away his most successful season so far, with 178 winners – including his first Grade One winner, Roksana, in the David Nicholson Mares’ Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival – and over £2 million in prize money.

In the curtailed 2019/20 campaign, his seasonal tally fell to 97 winners, but nonetheless included two more Grade One winners, Allmankind in the Coral Final Juvenile Hurdle at Chepstow and Politologue, trained by Paul Nicholls, in the Betway Queen Mother Champion Chase at the Cheltenham Festival. Indeed, Skelton was named Jockey of the Month for March, 2019 as a result of his victory on the latter.

However, Skelton had recorded his first winner at the Cheltenham Festival three years earlier, courtesy of Superb Story, trained by his brother, in the Vincent O’Brien County Handicap Hurdle in 2016. Sent off at 8/1 third-favourite, behind 7/1 joint-favourites Great Fields and Wait For Me, the five-year-old could be called the winner some way from home and ran on strongly in the closing stages to beat Fethard Player by two-and-a-half lengths; in so doing, he also became a first Cheltenham Festival winner for Dan Skelton.

How many times was Richard Hughes Champion Jockey?

Nowadays, Richard Hughes is a respected trainer in Upper Lambourn, Berkshire, where he is following in the footsteps of his late father, Dessie, who was a much-admired jockey-turned-trainer.

However, prior to August, 2015, when he made an unexpectedly early exit from the saddle, at the age of 42, immediately after Glorious Goodwood, he had been one of the most successful jockeys for two decades. Indeed, when he finally called time on his 27-year riding career, Hughes had been Champion Jockey for the past three seasons, with 172, 208 and 161 winners in 2012, 2013 and 2014, respectively.

Unusually tall for a Flat jockey, at 5′ 10″, Hughes first moved to Britain in 1994 and rode his first Group One winner, Posidonas, trained by Paul Cole, in the Gran Premio D’italia at San Siro in September, 1995. In 2000, Hughes rode over a hundred winners in a season for the first time and, the following year, became the retained jockey to Prince Khalid Abdullah, owner of Juddmonte Farms. That association, which was to last until 2007 and yield Hughes’ first and second Group One winners, courtesy of Cartier Champion Sprinter Oasis Dream, trained by John Gosden, who completed a notable Darley July Cup – Nunthorpe Stakes double in 2003. Hughes also rode regularly for his father-in-law Richard Hannon Snr. and, following the retirement of the four-time Champion Trainer in 2013, his brother-in-law Richard Hannon Jnr..

How much do jockeys earn?

Notwithstanding the handful of elite jockeys who are paid a ‘retainer’ to ride for individual owners or trainers, the majority of jockeys are self-employed. Retainers are rarely, if ever, in the public domain; the most successful jockey in the history of National Hunt racing, A.P. McCoy, for example, reputedly received up to £1 million a year from Irish billionaire J.P. McManus, but the exact amount was never revealed.

Self-employed jockeys are paid riding fees on a ride-by-ride basis, at a fixed rate of £120.66, or £164.74, per ride, depending on whether they compete under Flat or National Hunt rules. Jockeys also receive a percentage of any prize-money their mounts earn – 3.5% of placed prize-money and 7-9% of winning prize-money – plus income from any approved sponsorship agreements. On the other hand, jockeys must also pay a host of deductions, to their agent, to their valet and to the Professional Jockeys’ Association (PJA), among others. Collectively, these deductions amount to roughly 25% of riding fees and 10% of prize-money.

In summary, at the top end of the profession, jockeys can have impressive net worth earning hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of pounds a year. However, beyond the top echelon, annual earnings are likely to be much more modest; the average jockey can expect to earn in the region of £30,000 per annum, after tax and expenses, while an apprentice or conditional jockey could easily earn less than half that amount.

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