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This week we are bringing you a fascinating interview with rising weighing room star Nicola Burns, which Racing Post+ Ultimate subscribers first had access to on Sunday.
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Nicola Burns won’t be allowed to have a say in the forthcoming Irish presidential election as she doesn’t turn 18 until December – but Irish trainers have been giving the young woman from Delvin in County Westmeath their vote all season.
Burns has ridden for 55 different stables and that has helped her to what is already the fifth-best season by a female Flat jockey in Ireland since the days of the pioneering Joanna Morgan in the late 1970s and 1980s. Four more winners would push her into third, with only Cathy Gannon ahead of her, by which time she would also have ridden out her 7lb claim.
Winner number 21 of the year and 27 of her career arrived at Galway the other day, a typically savvy ride on the Kieran Cotter-trained On A Session from stall one, which was even more impressive given she reported that her saddle had slipped afterwards. You would never have known.
We are getting to know Burns better and better with every passing day and on a sultry September afternoon it is time to find out a little more. Her idol growing up won’t come as any great surprise to anybody.
“Oh, definitely Rachael Blackmore,” she replies instantly. “Seeing all that Rachael achieved was a big inspiration for me. She’s the one we all look up to now. She’s the one we all want to be. What she did was unbelievable.”
The recently retired Grand National-winning jockey has given female jockeys everywhere hope. She showed it can be done. Not only can you take on the boys at the highest level, you can beat them, too.
“It was her dedication,” she says when asked what the secret to Blackmore’s success was. “She was so dedicated and put her life and soul into it. Horses just seem to run for her. She got a serious tune out of every horse she rode. She loved doing what she did and made some career out of it. That would be the dream for me.”
Burns has spent the last few years playing tug-of-war with her mother.
“All I’ve ever wanted to do was be a jockey,” she says. “Even when I was in school I always wanted to leave, but the mother wouldn’t let me. She said I had to get my Leaving Cert and then I have the rest of my life to do what I want. So that’s what I did. I’m free now!”
Burns finished school this summer and it sounds like a third-level degree is not part of her immediate plans. Or her future ones, for that matter. She has one thing and one thing only on her radar.
She says: “I’ve just finished my Leaving Cert. It’s done now, thank God! I’m going full-time racing now and giving that a go. I just passed my driving test and I’m sorted with my own car now.
“Pony racing gave me the bug. Ever since I sat on a pony I’ve wanted to be a jockey. We’ve always had ponies and horses around the place, so I grew up around them and never knew a time when I wasn’t around them.”
Burns is the daughter of trainer Robbie and what a story it was in October last year when they teamed up to win a 7f Curragh handicap with Genuine Jim just three weeks after Nicola had taken out her licence at the tender age of 16. Now that’s what you call an explosive start.
“It was a great feeling, but it was actually more relief than anything. Pure relief just to get that first winner out of the way,” she says of her emotion passing the line in front.
Relief? At the age of 16 and only a few weeks in? That tells you all you need to know about Burns. She knew her first winner definitely wasn’t going to be her last. She’s ambitious.
“My goal for now is to ride out my claim,” she explains. “I need to keep going the way I’m going and keep on improving. I’m definitely not the finished article yet. My agent Ciaran O’Toole has been a massive asset to me, he’s been getting me plenty of outside rides all over the place. Every time I see my name next to a horse it’s a shock to me. I can’t believe it.
“I’m going to just keep my head down and ride as many winners as I can and not think about anything else, only winners.”
Ger Lyons has been giving her a big helping hand with those winners. She has ridden four for her new boss and was particularly good on Heather in a valuable Ballinrobe handicap back in June when she showed her strength to deny Elana Osario by a head. The runner-up went on to win a Group 3 and is now rated 102.
“It’s class,” she says of being a part of the Lyons operation. “Everything is so straightforward and everyone knows their job so well there. It’s some team with Ger and Colin [Keane] and Gary [Carroll]. I absolutely love it.
“Ger is brilliant to work for. He makes everything so straightforward. He keeps it all so simple and even after a race he would always offer great advice. Whether you were right or wrong, you always learn so much from him.
“Colin is so down to earth, too. You’d never think he’s been champion jockey so many times. He’s been fantastic for me. He’s been such a massive help to me along the way.”
We are granted access into the mind of Burns when chatting about El Bello, on whom she somehow managed to crack a code that seemed uncrackable. The enigmatic grey has his own ideas about the game and when he rocked up to Tipperary last month for a 1m4f handicap he had never won on grass before, never won beyond 7f and his trainer Ray Hurley had not celebrated a winner in 12 years. He was 33-1 and had you put a nought on the end of that price you still wouldn’t have had many takers.
“All I wanted to get him to do was enjoy himself,” Burns says. “The key was to let him enjoy it and just find his stride naturally. Let him do his thing. I knew he’d like soft ground. He was up in trip, but the way he finished some of his races, I thought he might stay and he did. It’s all about enjoyment with a horse like him. If he’s enjoying it, you have a chance. Then if he’s good enough he’s good enough.”
There is a very wise head on those young shoulders.
Deuteronomy has been the main character in Burns’s autobiography to this point. The six-year-old, trained by her father, won three times in June, with Burns doing the steering each time.
“The first time he won at Gowran was some buzz,” she says. “He’s a special horse and means so much to us. We were going to sell him and we ended up putting him in training to see what happened. He’s a little monkey at home. We didn’t even know if we’d get a race out of him and now we’ve got three! He’s been a smashing horse in our yard. He’s been very good to me.”
Before we go, a quick insight into Burns’s wit.
If you weren’t a jockey, what would you be, Nicola? “Lost.”
Luckily for her, she has found her calling in life.
This interview is exclusive to Racing Post+ Ultimate subscribers. Subscribers can read more great interviews here:
‘Willie pushed us higher and this season we’ll go higher again. If I’m getting pushed, that’s fine – I won’t crack’
‘Sean dreamt about being champion and I’m dreaming just the same’ – meet the ‘other Bowen’ fast making a name for himself
‘It’s pretty incredible for my third year – the problem is people think it’s my 33rd year and it’s more difficult for success to be recognised’
‘The buzz was back – and that adrenaline of nearly falling was half a second that you just can’t get back until you’re in that situation’
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