Mark O'Hare

Three bumper winners in three days is beyond any expectation I ever had, especially given that I was going to retire a few years ago, so it would be fair to say I’m loving racing at the moment.

You need to be lucky in this game and my association with Noel came about by pure fluke really. I was just sitting in the weighroom at Down Royal one day and I got chatting to Sean Flanagan and I fancied going into Noel’s to ride out as he is only 50 minutes away from me at home and it went from there.

Shoeing horses is my main job, I work for myself and doing my apprenticeship in that was the best thing I ever did in my entire life, but I keep a few horses with Jerry Cosgrave and I’ve always had an interest in how Noel trains his horses so I said I’d go in and ride out there and take a look.

This was only three months ago, long before there was ever any talk of Nina retiring, I didn’t have a clue about that, it was just purely down to being curious about training and wanting to know if I was training one whether I was doing it right or wrong.

To be perfectly honest, when I heard Nina was retiring I didn’t think too much into it because I’m not a bumper jockey really and I wasn’t sure if Noel was going to trust me to ride some of his fancied horses but to be fair to him he has put me on them and thankfully I haven’t let him down yet! Maybe it’s because I’m the oldest five pound claimer in Ireland!

But there’s nothing more lads in the weighroom want to do than sit on nice horses and I’m getting to do that. It makes life easy. Nobody wants to be getting tailed off in a point-to-point or a bumper. There’s no fun in that.

I did think of retiring a couple of years ago when I got real busy with the shoeing but I’m glad now that I didn’t. I’m my own boss now and I’m able to pick and choose a bit and manage my time well so at the moment I have the best of both worlds.

I did think of going training on a full time basis for a while but the shoeing was the best think I ever decided to do because training is hardship and seven days a week of hardship.

I love my point-to-points but it is always nice to have an odd winner on the racecourse too and I’m enjoying the change. I’m flat out at the point-to-points too but they’ll be finished in a month but I love the local point-to-points and that is going great too. I’m tipping away and I’m a few winners off Jamie Codd and Barry O’Neill for the Northern Title and Barry looks to have good ammunition to ride but as long as I’m tipping away, getting a few four-year-old winners, I’m happy.

I’m very grateful to the local lads who give me rides in the point-to-points and kept me going. Jerry Cosgrave and myself get on well and Warren Ewing legs me up on his four-year-olds and it’s just nice when people trust you to ride their horses when they are fancied. That means a bit to me.

When Jerry and Warren were using me and I had a handful of horses that I knew would win, it was just enough to keep me interested. That was super because I’m not one for sitting about and if I wasn’t point-to-pointing at the weekends I’d probably crack up!

The break in the point-to-point season is nice and I enjoy that as I get to spend more time with my daughter, Penny, and wife, Sara, so it’s nice to have the Saturday’s and Sunday’s but Penny loves going to the local meetings and I love bringing her and if you are getting winners that is what it is all about.

Driving to these summer meetings for the bumpers is a new experience for me though. Being from the north of Ireland I’ve been travelling to a few of those meetings on my own and they are long spins. I get my days shoeing done and jump in the car and head down the country and there’s days you are coming home smiling and there’s days you are coming home scratching your head but that’s why you do it isn’t it?

Noel and myself, we’ve been getting on great together and it’s new to me as I’ve never had a yard that was giving me that quality of bumper horse. I’m getting to sit on some really nice horses and I’m appreciative for the opportunities that I get because I know full well when you retire you retire and that’s it all gone. I’ve only got a few years left riding and I want to enjoy them and there’s no better way to do that than to be getting winners and long may it continue.