Russell thrilled with jockeys title Davy Russell is planning to celebrate in style after being crowned Irish champion jockey for the first time. Russell has finished second in the title race five times in his career but he admitted it had been worth the wait as he finally claimed the prize. Paul Townend was top jockey last season, while Ruby Walsh won six successive titles before that and Russell was thrilled to add his name to the roll of honour. "It's not every day that a day like this can happen and it's very special for everybody that's involved, with my family and everything," he said. "You can do nothing on your own. You need a lot of support and I've had that through the years from an awful lot of brilliant people - too many to mention really. "There's been Charles Byrnes, Liam Burke and all of those men. I'd particularly like to say thank you to my boss Michael O'Leary (owner of Gigginstown House Stud), Eddie (O'Leary) and everybody involved in Pat Doyle's team (trainer responsible for bringing on the young Gigginstown horses). "They've been marvellous to me really, they've stood by me the whole way. "We're going to have a right old party tonight and we're going to have a party in Youghal (his home town) during the summer and we'll let fly!" Tony McCoy, who was crowned champion jockey in Britain for the 17th time, also had his achievement marked with the presentation of a bottle of champagne and he was full of praise for Russell. "It was a great performance from Davy. To be champion jockey you need a lot of luck, a lot of talent and to work for all the right people," he said. "He's competing in Ireland with some of the best jockeys we've ever seen - you've only got to look down the list of the most recent winners of the jockeys' championships in Ireland to see how good you have to be."
