Meet The Trainees - Jack Hogan

Hello my name is Jack Hogan. I’m 17 years old and from County Cavan.  I got interested in horses years ago when we bought a pony of a farmer down the road just to have out in the field.  Then I started getting lessons from around the age of seven and stuck at it.  We then got a pony we could ride and started pony club I did a bit of showjumping and cross-country but the pony spent more time going backwards then forwards but when he went he would go 90 and I suppose that’s where I got the feel for speed. 

A few years ago I started doing pony racing on that pony. We were not much good at the start but we got placed a good few times and I just loved it. I went on to do 3 more years of flapping, riding my own two thoroughbreds and a good few other horses and ponies for other people, which was a great introduction into racing.  

I first heard of RACE when all of the pony racing lads came up here for an open day. I got a great look into the academy and wanted to come here. When I was 12, the summer before I started secondary school I started working in a local racing yard for Shane Donohue. I used to just muck out and look after the horses for the first while because I would have been to weak to hold any of the horses. But once he got me riding, I would only ride 2 or 3 lots a day until I was fit enough to ride the harder horses, then I was riding 6 or 7 lots a day. It was Shane who got me into horseracing and he was great to me, it was here that I got the bug for racing.  Last summer before I started in RACE I went down to Tipperary to work for my cousin Denis Hogan, just to see what it was like to work in a bigger yard with more horses and get more experience. Before I started in RACE in September, the lads there really helped me as I always wanted to be able to ride as good as them and it helps to have someone to look up to as well.

The Racing Academy is a great course and I have benefitted greatly because of it. I’m not only a better rider since September but I’m fitter and stronger too. I was fortunate enough to be sent out to James Nash in the first group and it has been a great experience there.  Although the course drags on in the winter months it has been a great experience which will only help me in the future.  Thanks to Niall Byrne and Barry Walsh and everyone who helped me along the way.  For the future I hope to become Champion Jump Jockey and to ride as many winners as I can.

Jack schooling on the Curragh Training Grounds