Jackson finishes on a high
Kiltegan jockey hangs up the reins after a super career in the saddle
KILTEGAN jockey Shane Jackson shocked the horse-racing world in Australia last week when he announced his retirement following one of his most successful seasons ever in 2020.
The reigning Tommy Corrigan medal winner and the winner of last year’s Grand Annual Steeplechase, Grand National Hurdle and Australian Steeplechase broke the news on his social media channels, stating that he would rather go out with people wondering why he had stopped rather than people wondering why he hadn’t stopped in a few years’ time.
‘A lot of sportspeople probably go on for that year or two longer than what they should. I’ve been riding for 17 years, but I think I haven’t ridden as well in my career as I did for the last two years and definitely last year was my most successful, and I thought, what do you do?’ Shane told this newspaper from his home in Victoria on Sunday morning.
‘There are a couple of nice horses there I could wait around for but I’m very interested (in the training). I’m foreman/assistant trainer to Lindsey Smith here in Warrnambool, we’ve 60 horses at work and I’m getting as much of a kick out of them winning as I am at riding winners myself. It’s more of a challenge.
‘Like I say I’ve been riding for 17 years. This is a sort of a new challenge, it’s sort of stimulating the mind more than riding which has come second nature because I’ve done it for so long. And thinking about it, I was starting to think about it – to go away and miss a day or a couple of days work to go to the races was sort of interfering with me where we were planning to
work horses or do this or that or the other. The other side of it (training) was grasping me a bit more. And, like a said, a lot of sports people go out a year or two later than what they should, and I’d struggle to replicate last season and I thought why not go out on top,’ he added.
The son of Colin and Geraldine Jackson, Shane grew up not far from village of Rathdangan and adored everything to do with horses from a very early age.
‘When I was a young fella, the father always had a few ponies around and you’d be going hunting and to pony club and all that. When I started getting to the age
where I was doing part-time work, I was doing a bit for my dad in the shop (Super Valu Baltinglass) and I was loving riding horses and he got me a part-time job out in Francis Flood’s out in Grangecon on Saturday mornings,’ he said.
‘The first morning I went out there on a Saturday morning I mucked out a couple of boxes, but I wasn’t expecting anything. He threw me up on a horse or two that first morning and it just grabbed me. It grabbed me straight away – the lads in the yard, the craic, the whole thing, it just didn’t seem like work. But I was only 14 at the time. I went through and finished
school, did the Leaving cert, but any chance, a school holiday, whatever, every minute I could get I wanted to get out to the stables. It just grabbed me and that was it.
‘I was mediocre when it came to looking like a jockey or riding like a jockey early days, still couldn’t wait to get my amateur license out, got it at 16, had my first couple of rides at 16. That was unbelievable. I was like a kid waiting for Christmas. It was so exciting. I was fairly average starting off, but I was lucky enough that I rode a couple of winners point-to-point in the first season.
‘When I did the Leaving Cert,
I went full-time for a year out in Floods and then moved down to Philip Rothwell in Tinahely. Did a short while there as an amateur, rode my first winner on the track against professionals as an amateur. I used to ask Philip could I just go and ride in maiden hurdles and all that sort of craic just to try look at Ruby and Carbery and look at all of them when riding against them even though I mightn’t be on something with a chance.
‘Through stubbornness and hard work, I improved and turned professional and it all sort of started snowballing then at home. I had a few really, really good seasons. I was champion claimer in 2007 or 2008, champion conditional back home. The top four claiming riders come over here every year to ride against the Australians. Back then they did anyway, it’s scaled back a bit now. I came over with Alan Cawley, Nina Carbery and Katie Walsh. We came over for three weeks, rode a few winners, kept a few contacts. I loved it when I was over here but at the time I didn’t think jumps racing was big enough to warrant staying at that time and things were flying at home.
‘Went back (home) for a couple of years and I was lucky enough that I had kept in touch and when things quietened off at home it was either give away riding and being a jockey, that’s nine years ago now, give it away and go work a normal nine-to-five job and try and earn a quid or give it a go over here. We said why not? Joseph was only a year old. We went through the whole process of getting sponsored and then came over with Joe and started to have a crack at it and now we’re here, we’ve had a good crack, we’ve three kids and a brand-new house,’ he said.
Home will always be Ireland for Shane and his wife Lauren but in Australia they have created a wonderful life for themselves and their three boys. That significant gamble they took eight years ago has paid off big time for them and while they miss Ireland at their families at times, life is very good for the Jackson right now.
‘Jumps racing has been great to me. I came over on a limb really because I had a few really successful seasons at home, and it just started fizzling out through the recession and maybe not being good enough,’ said Shane who has a blunt and honest opinion of his own abilities back in those early days.
‘At that time Ruby (Walsh), Paul (Carbery) and Barry Gerraghty, they were all still there. I was champion claimer, but I was probably never good enough to be champion jockey. I wasn’t riding enough winners in my mind and struggling to keep going. I moved over here, and it was a big decision on Lauen’s part as well, to move over. But Australia has been great to me. Just a few months back we bought a beautiful house just overlooking the Warrnambool racecourse.
‘You always miss home, especially now with Covid when you can’t get home as easy. We miss
home and we love home. The town that we are in is homely. It’s on the coast, we have a beach a few minutes from the back door. It’s a beautiful place to live. It’s like a country town, it’s as close to replicating home as you can over here. Work wise it’s a great country. If you put your head down over here and work hard, you’ll make a quid whereas at home it was getting beyond that before I left. It didn’t matter how hard you worked it was hard to keep your head above water. Over here, if you put the head down and work hard, there are plenty of opportunities for people.
Hard work seems to be a massive part of Shane Jackson’s successful career. The 34-year-old is a man who doesn’t seem to suffer fools very well. When you watch his interviews on Racing.com you see and hear a man who gives his career and his industry his absolute all, an energetic, committed and passionate individual who always strives to be better.
He also seems to be a man who follows his gut feeling and obeys his instinct but for him the secret to everything is hard work.
‘It’s a great attribute from my parents and grandparents at home - hard work. Apart from following your gut, and people talk about following your gut and luck and all that, I don’t care – anything you do in life, it’s something I’ve been taught from an early age – if you work hard at it, you’ll succeed in whatever job or line you go down. And people love to make excuses but there’s no excuse for not succeeding. If you’re not working hard enough, you won’t, and if you do work hard, doesn’t matter what you do, you’ll get on well,’ he added.
Shane reveals that he didn’t seek counsel on his decision to retire as a jockey because he knew that he would be talked out of it too easily. He says he has witnessed sports people who have kept going when perhaps they should have stepped away when the time felt right.
‘I’ve always looked at lads who have ridden for too long and I’ve said if you start to get afraid you need to give it away. I was still loving it, I won’t lie. I’m going to miss riding something shocking. Still loving going out and still loving winning but the other side was grasping me a bit more and I said why not pull the pin when you’re at the top of your game rather than in a couple of years’ time – like, everyone is texting me saying, ‘why did you call it quits?’ I’d rather that than people saying someone behind me back in a few years, ‘he should have given it away a couple of years ago. He’s past his best’.
‘I had a few lovely horses to ride again next season, the best trainers over here behind me and backing me, but when do you call it? That will be the same after next season and the season after. I started thinking, if you get a little injury at the start of next season and you miss a month – we’ve only a short jumps season here – through injury, and I don’t go out winning the Tommy Corrigan award next year through no fault of my own I’ll go again the following year to make sure I win it because I’m stubborn so when do you stop saying I’m going to stick around for this horse and then there’ll be another one this year?
‘I didn’t talk to anyone about it really because I knew I’d be talked out of it too easy. It was in my mind and I think if it’s in your mind you probably should just go and do it,’ he added.
There’ll be very little time for relaxation for Shane now that he has hung up the reins, not that he’d have any interest in that anyway. The former Scoil Chonglais Baltinglass student has the world of training to conquer.
‘I’ve been foreman to Lindsey Smith here in Warrnambool for the last year. He’s a trainer over here, moved down from Wetsern Australia. We’ve 60 horses in work, getting lots of winners. We’d a couple of Group 1 runners yesterday (Saturday) and we’ve a nice team of horses and it’s a path I want to go down. There’s maybe a possibility in the future of going co-trainer – a lot of the big teams over here, there’s lot of work for one single trainer so you’ll go in partnership. It would be something I’d love to do in the future. But it’s the same thing, I need to earn my stripes and prove that I’m capable of doing it,’ he said.
And finally, what were his highlights from a busy and memorable 17-year-career?
‘There’s a couple I suppose. Being champion claimer at home was a huge thing. My first ride at Cheltenham was at the November meeting for Shane Donoghue and I rode a winner there with my first ride. Just the whole being at Cheltenham and riding a winner was great.
‘But, I suppose, the highlight of my career would have to last season. Not every big race, but I won the majority of them here, what would be considered our Grade 1s at home. And then the Grand Annual at May Carnival, it’s the Holy Grail and that’s the race I wanted to win when I came over here eight years ago. And to win it, on a novice horse at the time, I’d put that as my highlight. I had faith in the horse. A lot of people thought he was too inexperienced to go there, I pushed for him to run and it was a race I wanted to win, and I won it.
‘A couple of years ago I said I wouldn’t be happy until I won a Tommy Corrigan medal and won the Grand Annual and I’ve won two Tommy Corrigans and won the Grand Annual last season’.