Champion Tipperary jockey to retire from riding for a career training

Two-time champion jockey Donnacha O'Brien is to concentrate on a training career after he announced his retirement from the saddle on Sunday evening.

The youngest of Aidan O'Brien’s four children, Donnacha is to follow his father and brother Joseph into the training ranks just three weeks after winning his second jockeys’ championship. 

Donnacha was just 16 years of age when he rode his first winner at Dundalk in September 2014 on Quartz, trained by his father. His last winner was Nobel Prize at Naas at the beginning of the month.

He said –  “After thinking about things for a while I have decided to concentrate on training next year. Riding has been very good to me and I owe everything to the people around me. I want to give special thanks to the Magnier, Smith and Tabor families along with my own family for all their support. I look forward to training a small group of horses next year and will hopefully build from there.”

Donnacha rode ten Group 1 winners in his brief career with Classic success coming on Saxon Warrior, Forever Together, Latrobe and Magna Grecia.

His final top-level success came on the Aidan O'Brien-trained Magical in the Qipco Champion Stakes at Ascot last month.