Irish jockeys and trainers to follow for the 2023 Flat season in Ireland
Two up-and-coming jockeys and trainers to note as the Irish Flat season gets under way at the Curragh on Saturday.
Jamie Powell
Twenty-year-old Jamie Powell certainly has the pedigree to be a successful jockey. His father Anthony won the 1989 Irish Grand National on Maid of Money, while his grandfather Peadar Matthews won a couple of Irish classics for Paddy Prendergast in the 1960s, on Arctic Vale in the Irish St Leger and Linacre in the Irish 2000 Guineas. But despite that background, Powell’s first contact with thoroughbreds didn’t come until his late teens when he joined Ireland’s jockey training school, Racing Academy & Centre of Education (RACE) near the Curragh, following in the footsteps of his cousin Robbie Dolan, now riding in Australia.
On graduating from RACE, Powell became an apprentice with John Oxx whom he describes as ‘a really big influence on my career’ and when Oxx retired he moved on to the stable of Johnny Murtagh whose own riding experience is something Powell has been able to benefit from – ‘every time you ride for him you come out learning something new’. Powell’s first ride was in October 2019 but he had to wait until the summer of 2021 to ride his first winner when successful on the Murtagh-trained two-year-old Threebagsfull at Bellewstown, with another five winners following later that year.
However, it was in 2022 that Powell’s career began to gather momentum as he ended the year with another 24 winners. Four of those were for Murtagh but he rode winners for 13 different trainers in all, including five each for John Feane and Tom Mullins. It was Feane who provided Powell with his first big handicap success on Ano Syra in the Rockingham at the Curragh last June and was one of two winners on the day to give Powell his first double. But he bettered that achievement at the same track in August when running up a treble for ‘the best day of my career by far’.
Powell struck up a good partnership with the Feane-trained Urban Oasis, winning four handicaps on that gelding, including the Ulster Derby at Down Royal, while another valuable win at the Curragh came on board the Aga Khan’s filly Kerkiyra, trained by Murtagh, in the Northfields Handicap on Irish Champions Weekend. Having spent the winter riding in Australia, Powell starts this season with a 5 lb claim and his sights set on becoming champion apprentice.
Jake Coen
Mention of ‘the Coen brothers’ might bring the American filmmakers Joel and Ethan to mind first, but in Irish racing its their namesakes Ben and Jake who are making a name for themselves. Ben Coen was still only 19 when becoming stable jockey to Johnny Murtagh in 2021 and later that year rode his first Royal Ascot winner, Create Belief, and his first classic winner, Sonnyboyliston in the Irish St Leger.
That same year, Jake gained his apprentice licence as soon as he turned 16 and made a dream start to his career with a winner on his very first ride under Rules after starting out in pony racing. Just a day after his elder brother won the Ebor on Sonnyboyliston, Jake Coen got the inconsistent Dare To Flare up for a neck win at 20/1 in a 16-runner apprentice handicap at Naas for his uncle Andrew Slattery.
Getting plenty of opportunities late in the year on the all-weather at Dundalk where he rode his first couple of doubles, Coen ended 2021 with 11 winners and more than doubled that tally with another 25 winners in 2022. Those were spread among a dozen different trainers, with seven of Coen’s winners coming for his boss Joseph O’Brien. He also won three handicaps on the progressive Pat Murphy-trained sprinter Craft Irish and kept the ride on that filly in a Listed race at the Curragh even though he was unable to use his claim.
Coen also won a couple of races on the Kieran Cotter-trained Lord Dudley, notably a 25-runner premier handicap at Cork worth more than €47,000 to the winner. Coen has a ride in another valuable handicap on the opening day of the Irish turf season as he’s been booked to partner Michael O’Callaghan’s smart Fastnet Crown in Saturday’s Irish Lincolnshire.
John O’Donoghue
Currabeg Stables on the edge of the Curragh is best known for being the base from which John Oxx sent out numerous Group One winners, including the great Sea The Stars, another Derby and Arc winner Sinndar and the Breeders’ Cup Mile-winning filly Ridgewood Pearl. With Oxx having retired in 2020, Currabeg is now home to John O’Donoghue who had a summer working for Oxx, and stints with other trainers, before taking out his own training licence from the start of last year. After obtaining a law degree in Ireland, O’Donoghue moved to England to become head lad to David O’Meara in Yorkshire and then spent four years as assistant to Roger Varian in Newmarket.
It didn’t take long for O’Donoghue to send out his first winner in 2022 when the three-year-old Cailin Cliste won at the Curragh in April on her first start for the yard at odds of 25/1 and the same filly went on to win another sprint handicap at Fairyhouse later in the year.
Most of the stable’s runners were two-year-olds, however, and they included the fairly useful Pearling Path who won a maiden at Fairyhouse on his second start. That earned him a start in the Chesham Stakes at Royal Ascot where he looked like pulling off a fairytale win at 80/1 until hanging in the closing stages and being run out of it by newcomer Holloway Boy. Pearling Path went on to be placed in another Listed race at Dundalk later in the year. O’Donoghue’s other winner to date is Song For Whoever who has shown fairly useful form at Dundalk, winning his last couple of starts there over the winter, and looks capable of better still.
Pearling Path raced in the colours of Bahrain trainer Fawzi Nass, while the likes of Ballylinch Stud and Al Kazeem’s owner John Deer were other notable supporters of the trainer in his first season. A larger string of around 40 horses this year should ensure O’Donoghue builds on his promising start.
Kevin Coleman
The elder brother of Aidan Coleman, Kevin Coleman was also a jump jockey in his twenties before injury and struggles with weight brought an end to his career in the saddle, the highlight of which was winning the 2007 Galway Plate on Sir Frederick. After gaining a degree in sport science once he’d hung up his saddle, Coleman started training at the Curragh in 2018 but is now operating from a purpose-built yard at Carrick-on-Suir in County Tipperary.
Coleman’s first winner came not in Ireland at all but at Beverley where the two-year-old filly Allhallowtide won a claimer in May 2019 on her third start – she was the only horse Coleman had run by then. More recently, Coleman has also successfully campaigned useful sprint handicapper Only Spoofing in Britain on a regular basis. As well as finishing runner-up in the Dash at Epsom in 2021, Only Spoofing was twice a winner at Musselburgh last summer. The stable’s first winner on home turf came more than a year after that Beverley success when Red Vermilion won a handicap at Fairyhouse in June 2020.
Since then, Coleman’s success has grown each year as the size of his string has increased and he sent out a dozen winners in Ireland last year. Besides Only Spoofing, who also won a handicap at Navan in May for the second year running, there were some fairly useful types among them including two-year-old filly With Love who was tried in pattern company and the sprinters Coumshingaun, Shoebox King and Catherine of Siena. Only Spoofing has an entry in a handicap at the Curragh on Saturday under South African apprentice Mpumelelo Mjoka who rode his first winner for Coleman when successful on Fleetfootsoldier at Dundalk earlier this month.
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