QUEEN OF AINTREE

From dreaming of a chance to race in point-to-point to the The remarkable rise of history-maker, Cheltenham star & National winner Blackmore

SHE once struggled for rides in point-to-points. Now Rachael Blackmore has won the world’s most famous horse race.

The sporting globe came to a standstill as Blackmore and Minella Times passed Aintree’s iconic winning post to create racing history in the Randox Grand National.

More than 40 years after Charlotte Brew and Barony Fort tackled the awesome obstacles – the 250-1 shot refused at the 27th of 30 fences – a female jockey savoured National glory for the very first time on a day when 10 of the first 11 finishers were Irish raiders

And this 22 days after Blackmore, 31, left the Cheltenham Festival as the top rider with six victories, including the Champion Hurdle aboard Honeysuckle (right, top). Both feats broke new ground.

Punters sent Minella Times off at 11-1 on Saturday, but the odds against Blackmore lifting the National trophy aloft would once have run into millions.

“Getting a ride in a point-topoint was the top of the mountain back then,” admitted Blackmore, who grew up on a dairy farm in County Tipperary.

A horse-mad youngster, Blackmore rode on the pony circuit before competing in point-to-points while studying a degree in equine science. “I was maybe 19 or 20 when I had my first ride in a point-topoint. I was third and I thought I was pretty good,” she recalled.

“I don’t think I got into the placings for the rest of the season, so I quickly started to realise how tough it is to finish in the first three.”

Blackmore was still among the unpaid ranks when she rode Stowaway Pearl for trainer Shark Hanlon (below) at Thurles in February 2011.

The horse won, but progress was still slow, and her move to turn professional – on the back of 11 point-to-point victories and seven as an amateur under racing Rules – on St Patrick’s Day

2015 surprised her friends.

Blackmore had to wait until September for her first paid success – the Hanlon-saddled Most Honourable at Clonmel.

Hanlon said: “You never get it easy for the first three or four months, but I told her that, if it didn’t work out, she could always go back to being an amateur.

“I’ve never had a better worker at my yard before or since. She has a great eye and she had absolutely no fear whatsoever.”

The winners started to trickle and then flow. Blackmore won Ireland’s conditional riders’ title for the 2016-17 camfor paign. The following year came the link with Henry de Bromhead’s County Waterford stable and the pair combined for Blackmore’s first Cheltenham Festival triumph aboard A Plus Tard in March 2019.

“You can see since she joined us how we’ve gone from strength to strength together,” said De Bromhead.

“They broke the mould after her.”

With Paul Townend, her rival for the Irish National Hunt jockeys’ title, nursing a fractured foot, Blackmore is within touching distance of another first when the season concludes at Punchestown on May 1.

Victory would trigger further questions about her gender in a sport hitherto dominated by men.

Blackmore hopes her achievements will serve to inspire all young riders with dreams, regardless of sex.

“Maybe there’s a lesson to young people out there – male, female, whatever,” she said. “If you want to go and do something, go and do it.

“To me, standing here right now, literally anything can happen. If you want to be a jockey, you can be a jockey.

“Drive on!”