Major wins
Ireland
- Champion INH Flat Race -(1) Blow By Blow (2016)
- Champion Bumper -(1) Relegate (2018)
Katie Walsh (born 18 December 1984) [1] is a retired Irish jockey who, in 2012, came third in that year's Grand National on Seabass, giving her the highest finish at that date for a female competitor, before Rachael Blackmore won the 2021 Grand National . [2] Walsh is the daughter of amateur jump jockey, trainer and television pundit, Ted Walsh and the sister of top class jump jockey, Ruby Walsh. She rode three winners at the Cheltenham Festival.
On 6 April 2015, Walsh became the third woman to win the Irish Grand National riding Thunder And Roses. [3]
She was previously successful in the sport of Eventing. [4] She began her riding career in 2003. Her first winner was Hannon at Gowran Park in 2003. [1]
During the 2010 Cheltenham Festival she rode her first two Cheltenham Festival winners. She won on Poker De Sivola on the first day of the Festival in the National Hunt Chase Challenge Cup. She won on Thousand Stars on the last day of the Festival in the County Handicap Hurdle. [5]
Walsh made her Grand National debut in 2012. She rode Seabass, who was trained by her father Ted Walsh. She finished third, which remained the best finish achieved by a female jockey in the Grand National until Rachael Blackmore won the 2021 race.
Walsh became the third woman to ride a winner in the Irish Grand National on 6 April 2015. She won on Thunder And Roses who was trained by Sandra Hughes and owned by Gigginstown.
On 27 April 2016 Walsh had her first grade 1 win. [6] It was Blow by Blow in the Champion INH Flat Race at Punchestown. [6]
In March 2018 Walsh rode her third winner of the Cheltenham Festival. It was the Champion Bumper, which was a grade 1 race. She brought her mount Relegate from the back of the field 5 furlongs out to catch the leader just at the line.
Walsh began working as a racing ambassador for the Grand National Festival at Aintree Racecourse in 2015 and continued in 2016 and 2017. [7]
Walsh married her long-time partner, the race horse trainer Ross O’Sullivan in Kildare in July 2013. Her sister-in-law is the Irish jockey Nina Carberry, who married Walsh's brother Ted Walsh Junior.
Ireland
Rupert "Ruby" Walsh is an Irish former jockey. He is the second child, and eldest son, of former champion amateur jockey Ted Walsh and his wife Helen. Widely regarded as one of the greatest National Hunt jockeys of all time, Walsh is the third most prolific winner in British and Irish jump racing history behind only Sir Anthony McCoy and Richard Johnson.
Ted Walsh is an Irish amateur jockey turned racehorse trainer who was born and raised in County Cork but based in Kill, County Kildare, Ireland. Ted is also father to amateur Irish National Hunt jockey, Katie Walsh and professional national hunt jockey Ruby Walsh. He retired from the broadcasting after 40 years working for RTÉ in 2023.
Charlie Swan is a former top National Hunt jockey in Ireland in the 1990s. He is associated with the great Istabraq, on whom he won three Champion Hurdles. He was twice top jockey at the Cheltenham Festival and was champion National Hunt jockey in Ireland for nine consecutive years. After retiring as a jockey he spent several years a trainer, based in Modreeny near Cloughjordan, County Tipperary.
Gordon Elliott is a County Meath-based National Hunt racehorse trainer. After riding as an amateur jockey, he took out a trainer's licence in 2006. He was 29 when his first Grand National entry, the 33 to 1 outsider Silver Birch, won the 2007 race. In 2018 and 2019 he won the Grand National with Tiger Roll, ridden by Davy Russell and owned by Gigginstown House Stud, the first horse since Red Rum to win the race twice. In 2018 he also won the Irish Grand National, with General Principle. On two occasions, in 2017 and 2018, he was the top trainer at the Cheltenham Festival.
Timothy James Murphy, known as Timmy Murphy, is a retired Irish jockey who competed mostly in National Hunt racing. A multiple Grade 1-winning rider, he is best known for his victory on Comply or Die in the 2008 Grand National. He overcame problems with alcohol, which had led to a prison sentence after a drunken incident on a plane in 2002, to resume a successful career and win the 2005 jump jockey of the year Lester Award. He won the Irish Grand National on Davids Lad in 2001, and the Scottish Grand National on Merigo in 2010 and 2012. He had eight winners at the Cheltenham Festival, the first in 1997 and the last in 2009. He recorded his 1000th win in Britain in 2010. Following an injury in a fall in 2010 he was unable to regain his licence to ride over jumps and switched codes, riding on the flat from 2015 until 2018, when he retired from race riding.
The Champion INH Flat Race is a Grade 1 National Hunt flat race in Ireland for amateur riders which is open to racing horses aged four to seven years. It is run at Punchestown over a distance of about 2 miles and ½ furlong, and it is scheduled to take place each year during the Punchestown Festival in late April or early May.
Aidan Coleman is a retired Irish National Hunt jockey. During a seventeen-year career based in Great Britain, he rode four winners at the Cheltenham Festival and a total of 13 Grade 1 winners. In June 2023 he sustained a serious leg injury in a fall at Worcester and was unable to return to race-riding. He announced his retirement on medical advice in April 2024.
Davy Russell is an Irish retired National Hunt jockey. He was Irish jump racing Champion Jockey three times, and won the Grand National (twice), the Cheltenham Gold Cup and the Grand Steeple-Chase de Paris.
Paddy Brennan is a retired Irish jump jockey. He was champion conditional jockey in the 2004/05 season and won the 2010 Cheltenham Gold Cup on Imperial Commander. He was based in Gloucestershire as stable jockey at Fergal O'Brien's yard for several years before his retirement in April 2024.
Tommy Carberry was an Irish jockey who rode mostly in National Hunt races. He was Irish jump racing Champion Jockey four times. He is best known for winning the 1975 Grand National on L'Escargot. He rode a total of 16 Cheltenham Festival winners, including L'Escargot in the 1970 and 1971 Gold Cup and Ten Up in the 1975 Gold Cup. After retiring from race riding in 1982 he became a trainer and in 1999 saddled the winner of the Grand National, Bobbyjo.
The 2012 Grand National was the 165th annual renewal of the Grand National horse race at Aintree Racecourse near Liverpool, England. The showpiece steeplechase, which concluded a three-day meeting which is one of only four held at Aintree throughout the year, took place on 14 April 2012. The maximum permitted field of 40 runners ran the last 4 miles 856 yards (7.220 km) of Aintree's National Course featuring 30 fences, competing for record prize money of £975,000, making it the highest-valued National Hunt race in the United Kingdom.
Nina Carberry is an Irish Fine Gael politician who has been a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for Midlands–North-West since the 2024 European Parliament election. She is a former champion amateur National Hunt jockey with seven Cheltenham Festival wins to her name.
The 2013 Grand National was the 166th annual running of the Grand National horse race at Aintree Racecourse near Liverpool, England. The showpiece steeplechase, which concluded a three-day meeting, took place on 6 April 2013. The maximum permitted field of 40 runners competed for a share of the £975,000 prize fund, which made the National the most valuable jump race in Europe.
The 2018 Grand National was the 171st annual running of the Grand National horse race at Aintree Racecourse near Liverpool, England. The showpiece steeplechase was the pinnacle of a three-day festival which commenced on 12 April 2018. The event was sponsored by Randox Health for the second time.
Tiger Roll is a retired Irish-bred Thoroughbred racehorse who competed in National Hunt racing and won the Grand National in 2018 and 2019. He has also won five times at the Cheltenham Festival: the Triumph Hurdle in 2014, the National Hunt Chase Challenge Cup in 2017 and the Glenfarclas Cross Country Chase in 2018, 2019 and 2021.
Bryony Frost is an English National Hunt jockey from Buckfastleigh, Devon. In 2019 she became the first female jockey to win a Grade 1 race at the Cheltenham Festival.
The 2021 Grand National was the 173rd annual running of the Grand National horse race, held at Aintree Racecourse in Liverpool, England, on 10 April 2021. The event was once again sponsored by Randox Health, although the name on the race from this year onwards was shortened to simply "Randox". The total prize fund for the race was £750,000, down by £250,000 from the last meeting in 2019.
Rachael Blackmore MBE is an Irish jockey who competes in National Hunt and flat racing. In 2021, she became the first female jockey to win the Grand National in the 182-year history of the race. She also became the first woman to be leading jockey at the Cheltenham Festival with six victories, including the Champion Hurdle, in 2021. The following year she became the first female jockey to win the Cheltenham Gold Cup.
Caroline Robinson, better known under her maiden name, Caroline Beasley, is an Irish jockey. She was the first woman to ride a winner at the Cheltenham Festival in Christie's Foxhunter Chase, as well as Aintree's Fox Hunters race.
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