UK female jockey secures 1,000 winners in the saddle
Hayley Turner secured the 1,000th winner of her record-breaking riding career aboard Tradesman at Chelmsford on Tuesday evening.
Turner has been a pioneer for female jockeys since arriving on the scene as an apprentice in 2000, notching a string of landmark firsts.
After reaching the 999-winner mark with Lunar Eclipse at Newmarket earlier this month, Turner was made to wait a little longer for her 1,000th — but appropriately it came in the Dream Ahead colours of owner Khalifa Dasmal for trainer David Simcock.
For it was in 2011 she broke new ground when steering Dream Ahead to victory in the July Cup at Newmarket, becoming the first woman to secure a Group One victory outright.
Dream Ahead’s triumph was quickly followed by another elite-level success on board Margot Did in the Nunthorpe Stakes at York just over a month later.
Beaming as she returned to unsaddle from Tradesman, who was sent off the 9-4 favourite for the two-mile Illuminate Christmas Ball Handicap, Turner told Racing TV: “It’s taken me plenty of time, it’s nice to see that the girls behind me that are up and coming — Hollie (Doyle), Saffie (Osborne), Nicola Currie, Josephine (Gordon), they are all riding so well every day. Although it’s taken me 20 years, it will probably take them half the time, it’s nice to see the progression from when I started to now. It’s great.
“It makes me feel very proud when I think that perhaps I played a part in the successes of their career, a very small part.
“I’ve seen a lot of the girls come and go and they’ve all played a big part in getting female riders to where they are now.
“Unfortunately Khalifa Dasmal’s not here, but I’m sure he’ll be watching at home and I’m hugely grateful to him. I’ve had a lot of fun on his horses over the years.”