PAT HEALY: Brand Ambassador Pat Healy reacts to the news of Barry Geraghty’s retirement, pays tribute to him and discusses the possibility of JP McManus finding a replacement.
Barry Geraghty
I wasnāt too surprised to hear the news that Barry Geraghty has decided to retire. When jockeys of his quality retire, you are obviously slightly surprised in that you expect them to be around forever which as we all know is impossible, but given Barryās age I canāt say I was overly shocked at his decision. We never really know the mental and physical pain that all jockeys go through and Barry is no different. Just looking back over the past five years, heās broken both his legs, both his arms, his shoulder as well as damaging his ribs andĀ the fact heās managed to bounce back from those is part of heās been able toĀ stay at the top for so long.Ā Jockeys like himĀ are able to get back up from all of these injuries and ride winners again, which for us mere mortals is virtually impossible. When they do decide to retire, I imagine itās a huge relief for them both mentally and physically.
Like when Ruby [Walsh] and AP [McCoy] retired, Barry leaves a big hole in the racing game and like those other two his name will certainly be etched in history. He rode 43 Cheltenham Festival winners, 121 Grade 1 winners in a career that saw him ride 1,900 winners and be crowned Champion Jockey twice. He won the Grand National, two Gold Cups, four Champion Hurdles and five Champion Chases and was lucky enough to ride some of the sportās greats like Moscow Flyer and Sprinter Sacre.
One of the greats
I photographed Barryās first winner and heās stayed with me on a number of occasions at Listowel down the years where weāve become great friends. I used to host a party every year with a buddy of mine āSneaky Booā during Listowel races and it was at that party that Barry met his wife Paula. Iāve got to know him very well over the years and the one thing that has always stuck with me is that heās always been his own man.
I was with him in 2002 and his phone rang. After 20 minutes or so, he came back and Sneaky Boo asked who had called him and Barry replied it was Paul Nicholls. He told us that Paul had offered Barry the job as his stable jockey. He turned it down as it didnāt quite fit in with what he was looking for at the time, but the fact Nicholls called Barry before he called Ruby showed the level that he was held in.
All through his career I always thought Geraghty had great luck. He was always in the right place at the right time. Mick Fitzgerald retired and he got the NickyĀ Henderson job at a time when Nickyās horses could practically do no wrong. And thenĀ when AP retired, he got the JP McManus job which is obviously one of the biggest going. When you work as hard and are as dedicated as Barry was, those things seem to have a habit of falling your way and I donāt think theyāll beĀ anyone who can say he didnāt deserve them.
You donāt ride nearly 2,000 winners including 43 Cheltenham winners by being an average jockey. All of these things go on your CV because you have the gift and the knowhow required to produce it time after time. Thereās no doubt Geraghty goes down as one of the sportās greats and heāll be missed for sure.
JPās replacement
Thereās been plenty spoken about who will replace Barry and from my perspective, Iām not sure JP will appoint someone. He has Mark Walsh in Ireland who is as good as they come and then in England I expect heāll keep using both Aidan Coleman and Jonjo OāNeill. Both of those two in England deserve a proper crack at it and Iām sure both will be up for the challenge. Youād expect Mark Walsh will ride the big guns at the bigger festivals, but JP has plenty of horses and I think for the majority of the season the workload will be shared.
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