Michael O’Sullivan

It’s not easy to get the time to reflect but, when you do, when you look back on last season, you could get very excited.  That wouldn’t be Michael O’Sullivan’s style though.  Calm in and out of the saddle.  Feet on the ground.  A demeanour that is a natural asset for a horseman.

Highs of the season?   

How long do you have?

His calmness was in evidence in the Royal Bond Hurdle at Fairyhouse in November, a Grade 1 race, his first Grade 1 race, when Hercule Du Seuil made a mistake in front of him.  In a heartbeat he went from travelling well on the inside, just behind the leaders, perfect position, to shuffled back to second last.

He just eased his way back in, kept his horse in his rhythm.  Moved gradually off the rail after the next flight of hurdles had zipped past, progressed smoothly past the weakening Hercule Du Seuil, eased past Prairie Dancer and, in the space of a couple of flights of hurdles, he was back in Position A again, just behind the leaders, minimal energy expended.

Even when Marine Nationale made that mistake at the final flight, when Irish Point got away from him on the far side with no more obstacles to jump and less than a furlong to run, he didn’t panic.  He didn’t reach for the kitchen sink.  He allowed his horse a stride or two to regain his equilibrium after his mistake before he asked him for all that he had.  It was subtle, but it was crucial, and it could have been the differentiator between victory and defeat.  He used every inch of grass that was available to him on the run-in, and got up to win by a half a stride.

“That was a special day all right,” says Michael now.  “The way that it happened too.  The way that the race went.  My first Grade 1.  My parents were there too, which was great.  I was still claiming, so for Barry to give me the opportunity to ride in a Grade 1 race, a race in which I couldn’t claim.  That was massive.”

Barry is Barry Connell, Marine Nationale’s owner, Marine Nationale’s trainer.  Strange the way life works out, the way relationships develop.  Michael was riding as an amateur in April 2019 when he saw that Barry Connell had a horse, Timewaitsfornoone, entered in his local point-to-point, so he called and asked for the ride.  He finished second, behind It Came To Pass interestingly, trained by his uncle Eugene O’Sullivan and ridden by his cousin Maxine, who would go on to win the Foxhunter at the Cheltenham Festival 11 months later.

It was over two years before Timewaitsfornoone ran again, in the Champion Hunters’ Chase at the 2021 Punchestown Festival when, again, Michael rode him.  And he rode him a month later to finish second in a hunters’ chase at Downpatrick. 

By then, Barry Connell had taken out his own licence to train, and Michael monitored his progress.  It was a year after Timewaitsfornoone’s final run that he saw that the trainer had a French Navy newcomer entered in a bumper at Punchestown’s May meeting.  He was out milking the cows when he texted Barry Connell to ask for the ride.  That French Navy gelding was Marine Nationale, and he won that Punchestown bumper doing handsprings.  Barry Connell’s horse has run in four races since, another bumper, a maiden hurdle, the Royal Bond Hurdle and the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle, and he has won all four, with Michael O’Sullivan on board on every occasion.

Good Land was another high, his victory in the Grade 1 Nathaniel Lacy Hurdle at Leopardstown’s Dublin Racing Festival in February.

“I’d say I got as big a kick out of that as I got out of the Royal Bond,” says Michael thoughtfully.  “The first race of the Dublin Racing Festival, Good Land was well fancied, there was a lot of expectation.  The atmosphere, there was a savage turn out.  I’d never known an atmosphere like it before, not when I was involved.  It looked like an open race on paper, but I was riding the favourite.  I needed everything to go right.  Thankfully, it did.  It was a big relief to get it done.”

There was a lot of expectation during the build-up to the Cheltenham Festival too if you had taken the time to notice it, but Michael was just looking forward to the week.  

“It was probably a bit greedy of me at the time, looking back,” he says, “but I would have been disappointed if I had ended the week without a winner.”

That’s winners for you.

“It was my first Cheltenham Festival, but I knew that I was going there with good chances.  So it was brilliant to get the week going so early.”

He couldn’t have got it going any earlier.  The Supreme Novices’ Hurdle is the first race on the first day, Marine Nationale again.

“It’s only when you watch it back that you can fully appreciate the enormity of it,” he says.  “Going past the stands with a circuit to run, all the people, all those sets of eyes, watching you, the Cheltenham Festival.  You try to appreciate it at the time, but you don’t.  Not really.  Patrick Mullins told me to take my time walking back in after we had won, and I tried to do that, down past the stands and back into the winner’s enclosure, but it didn’t really sink in.  It didn’t sink in for ages.”

And just over three hours after he won the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle on Marine Nationale, he went out on the Gordon Elliott-trained Jazzy Matty in the Fred Winter Hurdle and won that as well.  On Tuesday evening, at the end of Day 1, two winners on the board, he was leading rider at the 2023 Cheltenham Festival.

“It was an amazing day,” says the rider.  “Surreal.  I finished fourth overall in the Leading Riders’ table, behind Paul Townend, Harry Cobden and Rachael Blackmore.  That was unreal.  I have a photo of that table.”

He kicked on from his success at the Cheltenham Festival to be crowned champion conditional jockey in Ireland for the 2022/23 season, and kicked on again.  Demand for his services remains high when his commitments to Barry Connell allow.  The fact that he has ridden for the top trainers in the country is testament to his talent and the deep recognition thereof.

The new season stretches out in front of him, Marine Nationale going chasing, Good Land going chasing. 

“I haven’t schooled Marine Nationale over a fence yet,” he says, “but there’s no fear of him.  He’s such a natural jumper.  And I’m looking forward lots to seeing Good Land jumping fences.  All going well, it could be an interesting season ahead.”

Feet still on the ground.

© Racing TV Magazine, September 2023