Hayley Turner..........hats off to her

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Gonetofrance

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For being the first female jockey to reach the century in a season. Serious achievement in a world that has been slow to acknowledge women riders.
Go for your life in 2009, and let's have you riding in the classics, Hayley!!
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And I believe she beat some pretty big names to the Morning Line's racing person of the year or similar. I think they said she had 3 or 4 times as many votes as AP McCoy who was in 2nd place.
 
Hayley learnt to ride and kept her pony on the same yard as me when she was a kid.
She was one of those kids who was always being popped on the naughty ponies to sort them out. Bless her!
She was a lovely quiet rider then and she seems to have retained that quality.
Hats off to her, she deserves it!!
 
I could not agree more and I hope to see her getting classic rides as well. Why shouldn't she? In my opinion being a woman should make no difference to her having the ability to ride winners compared to her male counterparts, especially on the flat.
Would be nice to see Sheikh Mohammed or Godolphin throw some decent rides at the lass
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well done.....

i too, would like to see Godolphin give her a "leg-up".

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She has spent time with Godolphin in Saudi just after she finished her apprenticeship but as you say, it'd be good if she got some of their rides.
 
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In my opinion being a woman should make no difference to her having the ability to ride winners compared to her male counterparts.

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I think it makes ALOT of difference, hence there being hardly any good female jockeys!!!
I've only seen a few short clips of her on the TV, but she looks as good as any man! So good luck to her!!!!!!!
I hope she doesn't just get some classics rides, but wins them too
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Saw she had 98 winners uto yesterday and 7 rdes today. Fair does! I also think t does make quite a difference - female jockies often dont have the strength to ride out a finish lie their male counterparts. Cathy Gannon was champion apprentice over here and was used by lots of the top Irish trainers as anapprentice but once her claim ran out, her advantae wore off and her career has taken a downturn. Believe she is/was also in the UK this year.
 
She's a lovely girl, don't know her personally, but she has ridden a few of our horses.
She had a ride on a clients horse yesterday as well, a filly I looked after from birth to sales, and she came a very close second with her
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She had a fabulous ride out of her!

I hope she continues her success.
And as for race riding, they tell me it's very hard for a woman to make the right shape as a jockey, don't know how much truth there is in that!
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She has done very well
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,i personally think she will get a better tune out of some of the fillies aswell as she is so quiet and patient...she is able to to get some awrkward buggers to run well
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Lol my post was in admiration and praise for Miss Turner and not being sexist because she was a woman.
I meant that in the grand scheme of things the fact that she is a woman should not mean she is less able to ride out a winner against other jockeys including blokes. This is especially true on the flat where weight does make a difference and lighter framed women really should have an upper hand to those male jockeys who struggle with their weight.
I don't know if the same can be said over jumps. I know there has been debates on this before in the racing world, over jumps that is. Jump racing is thought to be more demanding, especially considering the higher percentage of falls to rides as the horses are jumping obstacles. I have seen debates in the community where opinions have bounced around on the capability of a woman's body being able to cope with such high demands and the likelihood of numerous and often repetitive injuries, such as broken collar bones.
Also when you consider the minimum weights for flat racing and national hunt then men do mainly hold the sway in the latter as I would imagine most female jump jockeys need to be given plenty of lead in their cloths. Before the likes of Nina Carberry there have been few female jockeys to scale the heights over the sticks. I suppose the only ones that spring to mind are Gee Armatage, Rosemary Henderson who I think was the oldest women to ever contest the Grand National on Fiddlers Pike ( think they finished 5th or 6th from memory) and the other lady Carrie Ford was it? Who was a former excellent ptp jockey who achieved a good success in the aintree foxhunter only a short time after recovering from having a baby.
Ptp jockeys aside there are few that seem to compete at high level over jumps and even fewer on the flat. It is usually as apprentices they are exploited due to their weight claims but once the maximum number of wins have been achieved and they lose their claim then life generally becomes tricky. They just don't seem to get the 'good' mounts.
I mean look at Alex Greaves, great jockey and gave an excellent ride to Ya Malak to dead heat with Coastal Bluff, Kevin Darley? in the group one Nunthorpe? a few years ago. She struggled to get high class mounts and yet was married? to a trainer, Dandy Nicholls.
Enuff said I have said my peace.
I am all for female jockeys and wish there were more.
I think their short supply is not down to getting rides but rather the route in which they get there. I think maybe in a few years time when some of the older brigade in the racing fraternity have moved on we may see a change.
I noticed how bigoted the sport was, and I was just a journalist, an outsider really. I wasn't partial to all the yard jibes and insults/put me downs that I can bet women all up and down the country have to endure on racing yards.
I can bet there are still many in racing who think the only good thing about seeing a woman in tight jods is their arse.
Many really don't get the recognition and chances they deserve. You may see plenty of lasses grooming, riding out up the gallops and even leading out at the track but I just wonder how many get knock backs from their employers if they express an interest to progress further and become an apprentice jockey.
I suppose we will never know as these matters are not spoken about are they. People dare not speak out because racing is very tight knit and if word got out from a yard as to why you were speaking out I can bet you would be lucky to find employment in that sphere again.
No as for the lack of female jockeys in the sport you need to look at grass level in my opinion.
People may think I am generalising but my views are stemmed by observations and what I have seen and been told both on and off the track.
Caz
 
I know a few years the jump boys hated girls riding against them in case they got hurt. Nina and Katie have changed that to a certain extent, but both of them are exceptional riders.
I'd say on the flat women jockeys have an equal capability, give or take the odd situation. For example, you wouldn't put a girl up on an horse that needs really strong handling, but by the same token, you wouldn't put the weaker men up too! Also, us girls can multitask, so we can think about where we need to be in a race as well as riding the horse simultaneously.........
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As far as women riding over fences, I think strength in a finish is far more significant, think of some of the slogs we've seen recently, Choc getting beat yesterday on his odds on (3-10) mare by an outsider. If that had been a female jockey, the punters would have been screaming for blood. Flat racing is more tactical, and finishes are more about judgement of pace, race postion and race reading. Jumping upsides at the last at Cheltenham is about pushing the horse to the line, and therein lies the bit that will be hard to change.
I don't think I'd have (ever had) the strength to carry horses the way the likes of AP does, and when I used to ride out for trainers, it's not always just skill, strength is needed when a leery horse goes to cock it's jaw. Now I appreciate even the male jocks don't always manage that, but I do (unless you're sitting on a sluice in) think upper body power is more important in jump racing. That said, there is definitely no reason why there shouldn't be more female jockeys, there are plenty of horses that don't need brute force, but the change will be longer in coming because a lovely ride in coming second is no use, winning is the bottom line.
I'd love to see Nina win a very high profile chase (other than the XC race) and watch the ensuing reactions.

Tin hat on!!!
 
Hats off to Michael Bell, too, for giving Hayley a chance to develop her skills and then having the confidence to put her up on decent horses - every young jockey needs a trainer or too prepared to back them but trainers have to be quite brace to promote a girl to their owners
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Good on her i think its great - saw a clip yest of her riding out a finish and she looked equally as stylish as her male counterpart - i couldnt tell them apart and thats where women struggel - the style!!

Very well said caz

I work in racing for a rather large yard for a lady trainer and you would be suprised what we (girls are not allowed to do) ie school - there is me and another girl (she has had about 10 p2p rides and me who has ridden up to Int eventing) we are not allowed to school where as lads with far less experiance - straight from racing school or with only limited jumping experiance are allowed to schoool horses!!
 
Another woman to watch on the flat is Emma-Jayne Wilson. She was big news as an apprentice (even though she started late, after university a couple years riding work), has won a Queens Plate, ridden in Dubai and Hong Kong. A really talented rider.

There have also been some successful female p2p/timber jockeys in the US, although I think they've all come from very "horsey" families, often with father/brother/uncle trainers.

Each step makes it easier for the next person who comes along. I agree women struggle more with the weight to strength ratio but for those that do, each success means trainers are more likely to take the chance.
 
I do not understand why over here we have such perceptions of women jockeys when Julie Krone showed how good women could be in USA winning classics.
 
I really don't think the perception is that much more favourable in the US. Yes, there are some relatively established women jocks but they struggle to get agents, let alone decent rides.
 
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