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The flat racing Champion Jockey and Champion Apprentice titles are awarded annually to the jockey(s) and apprentice(s) respectively that have ridden the most winners (both turf and all-weather) in Great Britain during a set period [1] or championship season. [2] The set period has varied over time, originally covering the calendar year when all flat racing was held on turf between March and November. Later, all-weather races outside the turf season were excluded, and from 2015 the championship season was further shortened to exclude the start and end of the turf season. [3]
The list below shows the Champion Apprentice and the number of winners for each championship season since 1922.
Following the changes in 2015, the Champion Apprentice is awarded a prize of £5,000. [3]
Kieren Francis Fallon is a retired Irish professional flat racing jockey and was British Champion Jockey six times.
Lester Keith Piggott was an English professional jockey and trainer. With 4,493 career flat racing wins in Britain, including a record nine Epsom Derby victories, he is widely regarded as one of the greatest flat racing jockeys of all time and the originator of a much-imitated style. Popularly called "The Long Fellow", he was known for his competitive personality, restricting his weight and, on occasion, not sparing the whip, such as in the 1972 Derby. Piggott was convicted of tax fraud in 1987 and sentenced to three years in prison, but served just over a year.
Lanfranco "Frankie" Dettori, is an Italian jockey who was based in England for a career spanning over 35 years. He was British flat racing Champion Jockey three times and rode the winners of 287 Group 1 races including 23 winners of the British Classic Races. His most celebrated achievement was riding all seven winners on British Festival of Racing Day at Ascot Racecourse on 28 September 1996.
Ouija Board was a British Thoroughbred racehorse. She was owned by Edward Stanley, 19th Earl of Derby, and trained by Ed Dunlop and Chris Hinson. In a career spanning four seasons, she won 10 of her 22 races, seven of them Group 1s, including the Oaks in 2004 and the Hong Kong Vase in 2005, while amassing over £3 million in prize money. In 2004, she won the Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Turf and came second to Intercontinental the following year. In 2006, she regained her crown, becoming the second horse to win Breeders' Cup races in non-consecutive years.
Richard Hughes is a retired Irish jockey and current racehorse trainer who is based at Lambourn in Berkshire, England. Born in Dublin, he is the son of successful National Hunt trainer, Dessie Hughes. Hughes became British flat racing Champion Jockey in 2012 and retained that title in 2013, when he rode more than 200 winners in the season, and again in 2014.
Jamie Spencer is an Irish flat racing jockey currently riding in the UK. He has been champion jockey in both Ireland and Britain and has won seven classics, five in Ireland and two in England. Spencer is an advocate for the art of holding up horses late into the races, and then making use of their natural dash of speed.
The champion jockey of flat racing in Great Britain is the rider who has the most wins during a season. For most of its existence, the jockeys championship was decided on the number of winners ridden between Lincoln Handicap Day and November Handicap Day, the traditional flat turf season. In 2015, it was announced that the title would be decided over a reduced timescale – the start of the Guineas Meeting and British Champions Day, roughly 24 instead of 32 weeks.
Jason Charles Weaver is a former, classic-winning, British flat racing jockey who had his major successes in the mid-1990s. In total, Weaver rode more than 1,000 winners in a career which spanned fourteen years. Since retiring he has worked as a presenter and pundit, and currently works on ITV Racing and Sky Sports Racing. Weaver is one of only seven jockeys to have ridden two hundred winners in a season, a feat achieved in 1994 when he finished runner-up to Frankie Dettori in the jockey's championship.
Mickaël Barzalona is a French-born Thoroughbred horse racing jockey, who is the retained jockey in France for Godolphin.
Charles James William Smirke (1906–1993), was a British flat-race jockey. In a career that lasted from 1920 until 1959, he rode the winners of eleven British Classic Races. As a rider, he was known for his skill, strength and tactical intelligence, together with his self-confident and outspoken personality. Although he never won the Championship, he was regarded as one of the best jockeys of his era. The Racing Post ranked him as the fifth greatest jockey of the 20th Century and the greatest never to have been champion.
The British Racing School is one of the two racing schools in the United Kingdom. Established in 1983, it is a charitable trust providing training for young people working in the horse racing industry.
Luke Morris is an English jockey who competes in flat racing.
Plack (1921–1940) was a British Thoroughbred racehorse and broodmare. As a juvenile in 1923 when she won three races and finished second to Diophon in the Middle Park Stakes. In the following year she recorded her biggest victory when taking a very strong renewal of the 1000 Guineas and then finished second in the Epsom Oaks. Later that year she added wins in the Newmarket Oaks and the Jockey Club Cup. She failed to win in 1925 but was placed in the Coronation Cup, Hardwicke Stakes, Doncaster Cup and Jockey Club Cup. Despite producing few foals she had some influence as a broodmare.
Oisin Murphy is an Irish jockey based in the United Kingdom who competes in flat racing. He has won two British Classics and a number of Group 1 races. He has been British Champion Jockey in 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2024.
Cieren Richard Fallon is a British jockey who competes in flat racing.
Royston Ffrench is a professional flat jockey. He was the 1997 British Champion Apprentice Jockey and has won multiple Grade 1 races in Europe and the Middle East.
Billy Loughnane is an Irish jockey who is based in Britain and competes in flat racing. He is the current British flat racing Champion Apprentice and twice British All-Weather Champion Apprentice.
Rossa Ryan is a Group 1 winning Irish jockey who competes in flat racing and is based in Britain. He was the British All-Weather Champion Jockey of the 2023-24 season.
Marco Ghiani is a flat racing jockey, who was 2021 British flat racing Champion Apprentice. He is the retained rider for leisure tycoon Peter Harris.