First Cheltenham success for Hughes
8th Mar 2010

Brian Hughes (grad. 2002) has moved onwards and upwards at a steady rate in recent years.  Champion conditional jockey in the UK two seasons ago with 39 winners, he upped the ante to record his first half-century last term.  And, more recently, he landed his first Cheltenham success in notable fashion on 30^th January.

Standing in for Howard Johnson’s injured stable jockey Denis O’Regan aboard Tidal Bay, 24-year-old Hughes grabbed his opportunity with both hands to capture the Grade 2 Cleeve Hurdle on a horse, who, for all his talent, has had more knockers than fans since being the dominant two-mile novice chaser a couple of year back.

It was somewhat ironic that Tidal Bay is trained by Johnson, for whom Hughes rode as a conditional for two years before adopting freelance mode in the spring of 2007. “There was never any falling out with Howard, who spent time nurturing me and taught me plenty,” insists Hughes. “The first six months I was there, I rode nine winners from about 60 rides.  It was going well, but then it slowed the following season; the opportunities weren’t there for me.  It was just one of those things.  I was frustrated, working hard and I wanted to get on – I’d just bought a house and had a mortgage to pay”.

Ambitious and articulate, Hughes moved to pastures new.  “I basically rode out for anyone who wanted me and by the end of that summer had ten winners ridden,” he recalls, charting a change of fortune, which brought fulsome rewards riding for trainers like Alan Swinbank and Richard Fahey.

Hughes hunger to make a success of his career remains insatiable.  “You see so many lads – overnight sensations - who lose their claim in no time and then are never heard of again.  That’s no good,” says the jockey, who has ridden 32 winners this season.

“You’ve got to be realistic, set goals that are achievable and try to keep improving and establishing yourself over time to gain a good reputation as a jockey who can make a difference.”

“Paddy Brennan calls me an anorak,” smiles the Armagh-born jockey, who thinks nothing of spending his evenings on the computer, trawling through facts and figures, scouring lists of entries, analysing past performances of potential rides or, and even more pertinently, poring over television replays of his own efforts in the saddle.

“I could get back from the races at midnight and I’ll stay up till one going over my replays”, says Hughes.  “It’s just the way I am.  I’m my own worst critic.  It’s the only way to learn, and to get better”.

Pic: Brian Hughes clears the last on his way to winning the Cleeve Hurdle at Cheltenham aboard Tidal Bay.

This News Article Relates To: Brian Hughes
Who graduated from the Race Academy in 2002

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