Aidan O'Brien: A Legend Of The Turf

Aidan Patrick O'Brien, born on the 19th October 1969 in County Wexford, Ireland, no-one would of predicted what a legend he was going to be in the years to come. 

Aidan began his career in racing very early in life and could not of asked for a better upbringing in the sport. O'Brien first started working professionally at P J Finns yard at the Curragh, County Kildare, before moving on to work for his very good friend and now great rival, Jim Bolger in Coolcullen, County Carlow. Whilst working for Jim, Aidan went to Galway to ride some of his horses and met Anne Marie Crowley, daughter of trainer Joe, who he later married and she provided his next move in his racing career. 

Anne Marie took out a licence so she could replace her father at the helm of their training stables in County Kilkenny. Aidan then soon joined her as assistant trainer and they have never looked back since. Anne Marie became the first lady to win the National Hunt Trainers Championship in 1992/1993 before handing over the reins to Aidan when she became a mother for the first time to now 2 time Epsom Derby and 2 time Irish Champion Jockey, Joseph O'Brien. 

Aidan got off to a flying start as a trainer, winning the National Hunt trainers title in 1993/94, 1994/95, 1995/96 before becoming private trainer to the powerful Coolmore operation in County Tipperary and becoming Champion Flat Trainer in 1996/97 and 1997/98 (his first two seasons at the helm). Although he trained inside Ballydoyle, Aidan still kept hold of Istabraq, by far the best hurdler of all time to this very day, who he sent out to win a 3rd Champion Hurdle in 2000. After Istabraq, Aidan moved pretty much onto flat training, relinquishing his career in National Hunt. 

Coolmore as we all know have always been the most powerful racing organisation in the world and with their influential breeding operation, Aidan was never going to be a failure at the helm, getting the majority of the best bred thoroughbreds in the world and has been Irish flat trainer every year since 1997 and in 2000, gathered a phenomanel €2.2m in prize money. 

Aidan's first ever Group 1 winner on the flat came in the 1996 National Stakes at the Curragh with Desert King, a race he has won 7 times since, most recently with Power in 2011. Since that first Group 1 victory, O'Brien has gathered an abundance of Group 1 victories including no less than 40 Classics in Ireland, England and France. He has trained some of the best horses ever in the last 25 years and those horses include Giant's Causeway, who won 5 Group 1's on the bounce in 2000, Rock Of Gibraltar who won a grand total of 7 Group 1's in succession and Galileo in 2001, who won his first 6 starts including the Epsom and Irish Derbies (Aidan's first ever) and has go on to boast records in those races that not many if any, will ever break. O'Brien has also never been short of top class 2yo's in his yard starting with Johannesburg who was an unbeaten juvenile in 7 starts in 2001, most memorably winning the Breeders Cup Juvenile which added yet another huge Group 1 to the CV of the master of Ballydoyle. High Chaparral was another special horse who came into Aidan's yard at the same time, winning the 2001 Racing Post Trophy, 2002 Epsom/Irish Derby and Breeders Cup Turf before coming back as a 4yo picking up where he left off, winning the Irish Champion Stakes and another Breeders Cup Turf. As well as many other horses who came along in that period, I just want to finish off this long paragraph with George Washington. He was maybe not as successful as the above, but was a dual Group 1 winner at 2 before as a 3yo winning the 2000 Guineas and the QEII, getting the nickname 'Gorgeous George'. 

2008 proved to be Aidan's best ever season after such an erratic few years after the departure of Mick Kinane, with the arrival of very talented and experienced jockey Johnny Murtagh. In this stellar season, Aidan saddled a whopping 23 Group 1 winners which included a clean sweep of the Irish Classics, becoming the first trainer to complete that feat since 1935. He also equalled the great record set by former Ballydoyle resident Vincent O'Brien (no relation) with 6 Royal Ascot winners, 4 being Group 1 wins and the most remembered being the hat-trick of consecutive Ascot Gold Cups for super stayer, Yeats. Duke Of Marmalade also won 5 Group 1s and Henrythenavigator won both the 2000 Guineas and Irish 2000 Guineas as well as the St James's Palace Stakes. It was a season never to be forgotten.

2009 could of been another season matching 2008 if it wasn't for one of the best horses in the world we will ever see in my opinion, Sea The Stars. He will of been remembered for winning 6 Group 1's in 6 months. Mastercraftsman, who is now siring some fantastic horses at stud, got the ball rolling by winning the Irish 2000 Guineas and St James's Palace Stakes at Royal Ascot although that meeting will always be remembered for the record 4th win of Yeats, a stayer that no-one will ever better. Fame and Glory sadly had to play second fiddle to the monster Sea The Stars but did lead in a Ballydoyle 1-2 in the Irish Derby, thankfully where Sea The Stars didn't run. Rip Van Winkle was by far the horse of the year inside Ballydoyle however, bouncing back from 3 defeats by Sea The Stars to win the Sussex Stakes at Glorious Goodwood and the QEII at Ascot.

Following a terrible winter that year, Aidan O'Briens 2010 campaign sadly didn't get off to the flashiest of starts that he was expected too but not long after the Group 1 wins started flowing. Fame And Glory, who played a similar role like Excelebration against Frankel but with Sea The Stars, got the first Group 1 on the board winning the Tattersalls Gold Cup. He then went on to win the Coronation Cup before the ill-fated St Nicholas Abbey took over that race in 2011. Royal Ascot that season didn't look two promising for Aidan, but when can you ever write him off? He plucked out two Group 1 winners in Lillie Langtry in the Coronation Stakes and Starspangledbanner who won the Golden Jubilee. A few weeks later, Aidan was again to add to his exceptional record in the Irish Derby with Cape Blanco to lead home a Ballydoyle 1-2-3, with the same feat happening in 2014. With the likes of Fame and Glory, Rip Van Winkle, and Cape Blanco to look forward to, we all knew the back end of the season was going to be a beautiful one for Team Ballydoyle. 

Since 2011, Aidan has won a whopping 44 Group 1s, a beyond fantastic achievement and on the 10th August 2014, Aidan won his record 225th Group 1 with Dick Whittington in the Keeneland Phoenix Stakes which cemented his position as the most successful trainer in Europe and the best in the world in my opinion. He is far from finished too and will eventually on numbers, hit the top of the tree. It was this win that triggered me to write this piece of this legend of racing, an inspirational figure that demonstrates the fact that if you want to be a success, you have to work hard to achieve it. 

Thank you to everyone who has read my piece on the master of Ballydoyle, a legend of the turf who will one day become the greatest trainer to of ever walked the planet. 

 

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