After taking 24 hours to digest the reaction of his fellow racing professionals, Richard Hughes is satisfied he made the right decision in announcing he will retire from the saddle in less than a fortnight. “I was delighted when I woke up this morning, really pleased,” he said on Sunday, the day after sharing the news through his Racing Post column. “There was a bit of indecision about, was I doing the right thing, who would I be upsetting if I carried on. Now, it feels like a huge relief.”
There have been glowing tributes from rival jockeys and slightly anxious ones from trainers who have been glad of his service but must now hope he is not quite so successful when he takes up their line of work.
Hughes’s plans for his own stable at Danebury in Hampshire are far advanced but bringing forward the end of one career will not necessarily hasten the start of another, as he already had it in mind to test the waters with his first runners this autumn and that remains the plan.
He is deferring a decision on when he will start training until his licence comes through. “I’ll have a holiday with the family in August, prepare the yard and then it’ll be into the sales,” he said.
Those sales and Hughes’s need to focus on them have been the principal cause of his unexpectedly early exit from the saddle. The 42-year-old is acutely aware of the need to stock his yard with the kind of animal that will show him to advantage in his first year and allow powerful owners to see if he will also be a force in his second career.
After all, he is giving up an excellent income in mid-season, when there are a handful of richly funded Group One races to come in which horses he usually rides will have excellent chances. “But you have to make sacrifices in life and this is one I have to make,” Hughes said. “I can’t jeopardise my next career. It means more to me than anything.
“I’ve got a page of possible owners, people who have said: ‘We’ll support you,’ but no one’s said yet, go and buy a £50,000 yearling. There’s one who’s told me to buy four or five and I know his budget but that’s it. So I’ll have to go and buy some on spec.”
It is a familiar task for established trainers, having to find horses and then find owners for them. Hughes has plenty of self-confidence and good reason to think he can do the job but clearly there is also a new kind of pressure. Few jockeys have approached the challenge with such relish and even Ruby Walsh, asked earlier this year about expectations that he himself would be a trainer in time, voiced concern that, having ridden for 20 years, he could “blow all my money in three”.
Hughes says: “I’ve seen 150 yearlings per year [through his long association with the Richard Hannon stable]. I’ve put a few horses to friends that have done well. When I’m selling, I want to be able to say: ‘I love this horse’ and the reasons why I love this horse.
“It’s important to me to be paying the £20,000 extra to buy a horse I love rather than buying one for £20,000 less because he was cheaper, just for the sake of having a horse to sell.
“I want to train every horse to the best of my ability, whether it’s a five-furlong horse or a two-miler. And I have the facilities to do that. I want my horses to be happy and healthy.” Naturally, he will be following some of the practices that have worked so well for the Hannons. “I’d be mad not to. And I have a few of my own ideas.”
In the meantime there is the day job to finish. It seems a pity that Hughes is likely to watch Ascot’s King George from the weighing room on Saturday but there will surely be some final winners next week at Glorious Goodwood, where he has been so effective in recent years and which will provide his final rides. “I had a look at the last race there,” he says. “It’s a seven-furlong handicap for horses rated 0-100. Now that won’t be easy to win.”
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