`Luckless` Maguire joins greats

Whoever coined the phrase `luck of the Irish` never met Adrian Maguire.

For ill fortune has dogged the County Meath-born rider and largely prevented his winning the top honours his talents deserve.

But for injury and the fact that he was unlucky enough to be born in the same era as both Richard Dunwoody and Tony McCoy, he would surely have been champion jump jockey in Britain at least once.

Maguire did come agonisingly to landing the 1993/4 title.

In a memorable duel with Dunwoody which went right down to the final meeting at Market Rasen on a Saturday evening in June before he lost out by just three winners - having been 42 ahead in early-January.

At that stage he seemed to be on an inexorable rise to the top.

A former point-to-point champion, he announced himself to British racegoers as a 19-year-old by riding Omerta to victory in the National Hunt Chase for amateur riders at Cheltenham for Martin Pipe in 1991.

He moved to England to join Toby Balding - who later gave McCoy his break `over the water` - and immediately took the conditional jockeys` championship with 71 winners in 1991/2.

Also that season he won the Cheltenham Gold Cup on his first ride in chasing`s `blue riband` event, forcing outsider Cool Ground up close home under a very powerful ride.

Only blip was the mix-up which caused several winners he rode in midwinter to be disqualified as he had been claiming an allowance to which he was not entitled.

Maguire then moved to David Nicholson`s powerful stable and the winners continued to flow, most notably Barton Bank in the King George VI Chase at Kempton in 1993.

But then he started to make the headlines due to his injuries rather than his riding exploits.

Maguire was level with fellow countryman Dunwoody in another good tussle for the championship when he broke his right arm at Hereford in April, 1995 and was out of action until August.

Within three months of his return he was sidelined again by a broken leg whichcost him the mount on Hennessy Cognac Gold Cup winner Couldnt Be Better.

And the next few years were punctuated by broken bones which twice kept him out of the Cheltenham Festival - a meeting he also missed due to the death of his mother in 1995.

When fit Maguire still had few peers, particularly over fences, and he won the Scottish Grand National on Baronet and the Whitbread Gold Cup on Call It A Day in a memorable eight-day spell in 1998.

Both that pair were trained by Nicholson, with whom he split midway through the 1998/9 campaign in slightly acrimonious circumstances.

But the jockey has been given a new lease of life by teaming up with Ferdy Murphy in recent seasons, winning another Scottish National on Paris Pike and enjoying other big triumphs on Ackzo, Ballinclay King and Narrow Water.

And in 1999 he was appointed a tourism sporting ambassador for Ireland by Bord Failte, in recognition of his huge reputation in the sport and his popularity with the British racegoing public.