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There was a sense this was on the way. Rachael had a good Cheltenham but it had been a quiet year up until then.
I think she is making the right decision to get out now in one piece after such a magnificent career. She has achieved everything in the top races.
Best of luck to her. She has been a huge asset to racing.
https://www.racingtv.com/news/rachael-blackmore-announces-retirement-from-riding
I hope Shark gets the recognition he deserves in helping her at the start of her career.
Rachael didn’t forget to mention him:
“I rode my first winner for Shark Hanlon, who then helped me decome Champion Conditional. I will be forever gratetul to Shark for getting behind me, supporting me and believing in me when it would have been just as easy to look elsewhere. He was the catalyst for what was to come.”
Pleased to hear that. I always backed his horses when she rode for him, not realising at the time what she would go on to achieve.
While she had a ok Cheltenham the season was a bit of a non event after her injury , the biggest compliment you can give her seeing down to ride wouldn’t effect your bet , could be a summer of jockey movements
Rachael is a rare example of somebody who attracted an additional audience to racing without being overhyped or forced on us. An excellent jockey at her peak, she seems a great person too. I wish her all the best in the next chapter of her life.
I suppose the only false note in her otherwise impeccable career was when she rode a finish a circuit too soon at Kilbeggan and then gave a ridiculous excuse about the horse being “lairy”.
Although I attach far more blame to the stewards for believing her or for not having the courage to stand up to one of the weighing room’s stars.
I have to take issue with the “Racing Post” which described Rachael’s effort on A Plus Tard in the Cheltenham Gold Cup as “a truly sublime ride.”
Was it? Maybe in terms of riding a waiting race. But I said at the time and still believe she did not need to win by so far or subject the horse to such an unnecessarily hard race. It finished the horse. He was never the same afterwards.
To be fair, there might have been other issues we don’t know about. And he is not the first Cheltenham Gold Cup winner to be bottomed by the race. But the fact the horse was never the same afterwards makes me uneasy about the use of the word “sublime”.
Fantastic achievement to win all the major races at Cheltenham, as well as the Grand National, in my opinion a very good jockey full stop. All the best in your retirement.
She didn’t need to win by so far but he was sick in the Betfair and didn’t go a yard:
“His work had been really good and his run in Haydock was just too bad to be true,” de Bromhead told Racing TV.
“We took bloods from him on the Monday before he was to go and they were perfect. The Monday, two days after he ran, one of the readings was sky high — off the Richter scale. The vets think it showed a bizarre allergic reaction to something.”
That’s more likely to have caused a problem than the race 8 months earlier.
A happy retirement to her and congrats to such an outstanding career.
Whether A Plus Tard was finished right after the GC or eight months later I don’t know. But, there seem to be quite a few Cheveley Park horses that are finished long before their expiration date:
Sir Gerhard, Envoy Allen, A Plus Tard, Quilixos…..
They don’t seem to train on when reaching a certain age.“Rachael is a rare example of somebody who attracted an additional audience to racing without being overhyped or forced on us”
Ain’t quite sure about that. There was a point when you couldn’t open the racing pages of a newspaper without seeing her fizzog forced into our faces and hearing Ed Chamberlain on ITV Racing babbling on about how great was she.
“there seem to be quite a few Cheveley Park horses that are finished long before their expiration date:
Sir Gerhard, Envoy Allen, A Plus Tard, Quilixos…..”Well…
Sir Gerhard achieved more than anything he beat in the Cheltenham bumper, including the much vaunted runner up Kilcruit. He wasn’t good over chase fences and best at the intermediate trip but , as there is no G1 Cheltenham race for these hurdlers, after the Baring Bingham he was a square peg being bashed into various round holes.Envoi Allen was , like Samcro, overhyped as the messiah. Again best at intermediate distance so viewed as an underachiver. But won the Ryanair at 9 and another G1, albeit a poor one, at rising 11.
Quilixios beat this year’s QMCC winner earlier in the season, came 2nd in the Tingle Creek albeit a thin one and was running a nice race when coming down at Cheltenham. Looking at a list of recent Triumph winners he’s not very out of place.
Envoi Allen had quite a good career. He is only seen as disappointing because he was hyped up too much before he had ever raced outside of bumpers and novice company.
His novice chase season was interrupted by the Elliott Sitting On A Dead Horse saga. I am not sure if it made any difference but moving stables just before Cheltenham cannot have been an advantage.
Timeform’s last ever edition of Chasers & Hurdlers covered the 2019-20 season. Their essay on Envoi Allen, who had just completed his novice hurdle campaign, ends with the assertion that the horse could become one of the sport’s all-time greats.
Not much hype there.
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