Cian Hughes

I'm from Celbridge, Co Kildare and my father did a bit of hunting as a hobby. Basically, I was down the road from David Bean's yard, he had a busy little yard breaking horses so I kept my pony down there with him when I was seven years old. I got into the racehorses through David and he got me riding. I went down there every day after school and on weekends. I also went around the yards that David was riding out in. Paul Flynn was from up the road and he started down there as well. I followed him as he had gone on to England when I was in David's. After that, it was all horses for me. I progressed with David through riding racehorses and he got me in with John Mulhern in the Curragh. That was the first racing yard during school. I got a summer job there and Stephen McCarthy looked after me, he was the assistant trainer. He got me riding out and I went racing a lot with Stephen. I got the train up there every morning. They looked after me well and I got my amateur licence when I was there. John gave me a couple of spins in amateur races when I was only 16. That was a good start. I was just doing it for fun, but I kept the amateur licence for maybe eight to 10 years and I was also riding in point-to-points.

After school, I went full-time with Oliver McKiernan who wasn't far from me. I did loads of jumping up there. Alan Fleming was there and he was the assistant/head man. They had great facilities there and Alan had me doing loads of schooling. They had a good few point-to-point horses there at the time. That got me into the point-to-point side of things. Oliver gave me my first three point-to-point winners. My first winner was on the inside of Naas racecourse when they had point-to-points there. It was a great day, the horse was called Pullonit (2004) and she was a seven-year-old mare. I loved working with the horses and doing a small bit of riding as an amateur. I was there for a season or two, but it was quiet in the summer in Oliver's. There was work experience on offer in Martin Pipe's in England, so I went there to do just one month's work experience and I ended up staying there for nearly two seasons. There was a few Irish lads over there, so I ended up staying. It was towards the end of his career, but he was still the trainer. It was a shock to the system as there was 120 horses in the main yard with a huge number of staff. It was easy to work there, he was good to work for, and he was very clever. He had all the information on all the horses on his desk every day and kept records on absolutely everything. The woodchip gallop up the hill was unreal. You never rode the same horse too much in Pipe's, they kept swapping you. It was a huge learning curve to work in such a big yard. It was so well run. I picked up a lot of things over there on how he did the interval training and how every horse has their schedule. Martin gave me some rides on the track as well - I had 20 or 30 rides, so it was good experience learning on tracks over there. I broke my shoulder badly there and was out for a good couple of months, so that got me back home. The next season David (Pipe) took over.

I did two seasons with Tom Taaffe which was great experience and I also started riding out for trainers that I knew, one or two days a week. I rode out for Philip Dempsey, Gerry Keane and Gordon Elliott. I was also riding in point-to-points and, at that stage, I was doing one or two of my own horses in the afternoons. I was buying and selling one or two. I would point-to-point them and get them to win or place, and sell them on. My first horse I sold to Gigginstown and that got me going buying one or two at a time. He was called Sweeney Tunes and he came second in a point-to-point for me (Loughbrickland, 2010), and he went on to win a Grade 2 (for Paul Nolan at Naas, 2013). We enjoy the point-to-pointing and had Chantry House through our hands in more recent years. He won a point-to-point for me (Tattersalls Farm, 2018). Subsequently, he became a Grade One horse that has done very well for Nicky Henderson.

Jim McCartan, a breeze up man, approached me and I did several seasons with him breaking the yearlings and getting them ready for the breeze ups. That is where I learned a lot about the sales side of things, conformation, and what horses you can buy and the horses you shouldn't buy. That was a huge learning curve on the buying and selling, and how the sales work.

As regards getting the licence, I was always doing my own in the afternoon and I just got more horses to break and pre-train. I pushed up to 20 horses so then I went full-time on my own. It was a few local people that I was pre-training for that said that if I had the licence, I could run them. I just thought it would keep us busy through the summer. Thompson Gunner was bred by Danny Coogan, he's only a few miles away. When I took out the licence, he said I could keep him.

We are just outside Kilcock on the Summerhill Road and we do a bit of everything here including point-to-pointers and breeze up horses. The gallop is new, it is only two or three years old. It is a three-furlong sand-gallop and we have a new row of stables, a new walker and a new lunge ring. There's probably room for 35 horses and I'm looking for more horses. I'd love to get a few more winners and get some more business in, especially to keep us busy through the summer. We are dual purpose in terms of National Hunt or Flat. I'd love to have plenty more for Dundalk, we find it great. The surface is good and the races don't take anything out of the horses really. They bounce out of it. Deed Pole won there last year and he was my first racecourse winner. We've started this year with two winners there in Thompson Gunner and Without Love. We'd like to have more for the next Winter Series and, with the new all-weather track coming in at Tipperary, we'd be looking for more all-weather horses. We would travel to Tipperary as well and it is something we could plan for. We have a couple for Dundalk, and a couple for hurdling, and a bunch of unnamed young horses coming along. Thompson Gunner could switch to the turf when it starts and Launch Time will probably be out early in the season. He's a maiden, but he was placed three times last year. I think he's capable of getting a win.

Cian was in conversation with Michael Graham.

If you would like your racing story covered in this blog, please email [email protected]

About Michael Graham

Michael has worked in horse racing journalism for more than 15 years, having also written a weekly betting column on Gaelic football and hurling for a newspaper. He is involved in writing the My Racing Story features on this website. He spent a year in South Africa completing a Diploma in Business Administration and also studied Newspaper Journalism in Belfast. He enjoys playing 5-a-side football on a regular basis.

View Latest Articles by Michael Graham