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Relocating to Ireland would be a big decision for Bowen. Would he want to?
I also get the impression that the jumping scene in Ireland is a bit insular. Would the appointment of a British jockey to the second largest yard in the country be well received?
I know Ryan Moore rides for O’Brien but I think the Flat has to think on a more international basis.
CAS Elliott needs to think out the box , as far as I know Sean hasn’t family so what’s to stop him , who cares what the Irish think , he needs to take the next step , Murphy is an excellent trainer but Elliott is the top table , if offered it he couldn’t say no
Isn’t Murphy a protege of Elliott? I don’t imagine he would like his old boss pinching his stable jockey!
Murphy can’t compete with Elliott , it’s akin to McCoy leaving Pipe , it hurt him but he had to do it , if he went to Elliott he would be riding in grade 1s every week not slogging handicappers around ffos las … He doesn’t want to become the next Brian Hughes
Elliott has to get a jockey , I imagine Gigginstown will already be considering there next move , they had nothing all week , to spend all that money and having nothing to show for it … If neither party does nothing and just hope that Kennedy can soldier then they deserve to fail
If I was him, I’d go after Darragh O’Keefe. Blackmore is still getting most of De Bromheads big rides so Elliot could tempt him away if he promises the No1 spot.
That is more likely to happen. I just cannot see an Irish jumps stable going for a British jockey when there are so many good riders in Ireland.
Set for a summer return:
Should have stayed away from Cheltenham. Ruined everything for the stable, for punters and also the jockey who sat on the ill-fated Corbett’s Cross.
Agree. I am sorry for Jack Kennedy and his bad luck with injuries but I can’t believe a jockey who was described as “limping” was in any way an asset to his rides.
It does not reflect well on Gordon Elliott that he has allowed a crocked stable jockey to ride at 2 of the last 3 festivals. This is elite level sport, where fine margins make a difference.
Sorry this may sound brutal but Kennedy is done , Elliott has to get a fit and talented no1 ….
I’m half thinking a retirement announcement could be on the way.
It was a shocking decision to let him ride at Cheltenham. You wouldn’t see it in any other sport.
Six broken legs at such a relatively early stage of his career goes way beyond being ‘just unlucky’ and we are now at the stage where you just expect an injury from any fall he has and any racing operation (let alone one as big as Elliott’s is) simply cannot employ a stable jockey that is as injury prone as he is.
I am not sure there is really any evidence that his conditioning (or potential lack thereof) affected his riding at Cheltenham and was the difference between a mount of his winning or losing and I certainly don’t think you can lay any blame of the sad demise of Corbetts Cross on him….the horse was well known for not being the most fluent of jumpers to begin with and many of his races were noted for jumping errors of some sort even though he had only fallen twice before the Gold Cup.
I feel really sorry for the guy having to go through these injury issues time and again as when he is fit and on his game he is clearly one of the best around but this sport is still a business at its core and I find it rather hard to believe that somebody as mercenary as O’Leary can (and often is) hasn’t forced the issue of employing a new stable jockey (at least for his own large string of horses) under threat of moving them elsewhere.
I have said this before but I think he really should consider seeking out advice from movie stuntmen and possibly get some extensive training from them on how the best way to fall from a moving object is, as it surely would be very beneficial to him given that in his job the stats are that pretty much 1 in every 4 rides result in a fall for a NH jockey.
At this stage he needs to think very much outside the box as what he is (and has) been doing recovering from injury doesn’t seem to be preventing the same injury issue from recurring far too frequently.
The alternative is removing from his life the potential cause of that injury from happening again and that is unfortunately retirement from race riding.
“I am not sure there is really any evidence that his conditioning (or potential lack thereof) affected his riding at Cheltenham and was the difference between a mount of his winning or losing”.
Maybe not. But if I was an owner who had spent a five or six figure sum on a horse and was paying thousands of euros in training fees; and was living my dream by standing in the paddock at Cheltenham only to be greeted by the jockey who was going to ride my expensive purchase limping towards me; I think I would be perfectly entitled to ask the trainer to whom I was paying the expensive training fees what he thought he was doing.
CAS, is spot on. If Kennedy were a F1 driver, where similar amounts of money are invested over the years, he would be without a cockpit after just a few races.
To be a fully fit athlete is your own responsability towards the horse, yourself, the connections and the general public. The dangers of the game were highlighted only weeks before the Festival with Michael O’Sullivan sadly paying the ultimate price.
I still can’t believe how they treated Sam Ewing and allowed JK to have rides at Cheltenham after being something like 1 from 17 since returning to the saddle.
You can’t have scouts and bloodstock agents working all over GB, IRE and FR for you, spending millions a year and employing someone who just isn’t up to the task.If Kennedy does need replaced I think Sam Ewing can do the job very nicely. And has the advantage of close contact with the Irish P2P world where Elliott gets a lot of his horses.
Can’t compare it to an F1 driver – the physical and mental demands of driving a F1 car at 150+mph with the g-forces faced for over 2 hrs the race can take to complete means that you simply can’t afford to be doing it with any type of injury.
A jockey walking with a limp doesn’t automatically mean that he is not capable of riding to the same level if he didn’t have the limp – he would have needed to have passed the doctor before coming back to ride and maybe the limp only presented itself when walking and it didn’t affect him when in the saddle where balance is the main issue not walking.
Yes the optics are terrible but if he wasn’t capable of riding he wouldn’t have been passed to do so, as gone are the days where jockeys could pull a fast one like Jonjo did when riding Sea Pigeon to victory in the Ebor with several broken toes in one foot – he convinced the doctor by simply presenting his uninjured foot for inspection!!!! Or cases where jockeys simply defied medical advice like Lester did in coming back to ride and win the 1000g a mere week after almost having his ear severed in a starting stalls accident.
Do I think Elliott should get a new stable jockey…..quite frankly yes as I don’t really see the situation improving with Kennedy who clearly must have some fundamental weakness in that leg for it to keep getting re-broken and from a business perspective, he is the weakest link (and for a while now) and is really a continuing liability for the Elliott team to have to carry.
First and foremost a jockey has to (at a bare minimum) be able to show that he can be relied upon to remain fit and be available as the retained stable jockey – he simply fails to check that box and Elliott needs to move on…..I would be very surprised if they don’t part ways at the end of this season.
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