A chance to catch last week's Racing Post point-to-point focus column which was published on Friday, January 22.
At nearly 31 Alex Edwards has left it late to become a conditional jockey, but he does not lack talent, writes Carl Evans.
Britain’s champion point-to-point rider in the 2017/18 season during which he rode 42 winners, and currently heading the men’s championship in this disjointed season, Edwards (pictured above) is a familiar face in races under Rules and has won Foxhunter Chases at Cheltenham and Aintree. His brother Lee is a professional jump jockey.
Mr Alex Edwards is expected to ride as Alex Edwards, claiming 3lb, tomorrow at Haydock when teaming up with trainer Alastair Ralph, but it is his association with Philip and Melanie Rowley’s stable near his home at Much Wenlock in Shropshire which has inspired the late move to professional status.
Phil was Britain’s champion point-to-point trainer in 2017/18, and saddled the two Foxhunter winners ridden by Edwards, namely Hazel Hill and Bear’s Affair – the last-named finished second to Balnaslow in Aintree’s ‘Amateurs’ Grand National’ in 2018, but recently, after a lengthy irregular substance inquiry, was awarded the race.
At a time when point-to-pointing on both sides of the Irish Sea is on hold due to restrictions on non-elite sports, and amateur riders cannot ride under Rules, the loss of a top talent and respected champion is a blow, and Edwards admits: “I intended to remain an amateur for the whole of this season, but the shut downs made me think again.”
Yet he would almost certainly have become a conditional jockey at some point this year because of changes at the Rowley yard. Melanie, who has trained nine winners this season and heads the Foran Equine Trainers’ Championship for yards with eight or more horses, has been preparing to gain a full licence and is set to saddle her first runners in that role next month – yesterday she saddled Hazel Hill at Ludlow in Britain’s opening hunter chase of the season.
Edwards, who was an apprentice on the Flat for two seasons and can comfortably ride at low weights, is a vital cog in the Rowleys’ set-up, but as he says: “I couldn’t expect to be regarded as the stable jockey at a 40-horse yard if I was still an amateur.”
Other amateurs have been enquiring about changing to conditional status, but it seems the BHA is not keen on a slew of people becoming professionals to ride in hunter chases, only to revert to amateur status when pointing resumes – with changes at the Rowleys’ yard, Edwards could claim a significant reason for applying.
Jack Andrews, the reigning British men’s champion, looked into the idea but says he was told he would have to attend a two-week conditional jockeys’ course, and there were none in the pipeline. He said: “Even if a course came up in the next two or three weeks I would spend two weeks on the course and then it would take another couple of weeks to gain the licence, by which time point-to-pointing may well have returned. For now I’ll wait to see what happens.”
Who let the Fox out?
Great news this week that St James’s Place Wealth Management has added another five years to their Cheltenham Foxhunter Chase sponsorship.
However, a Cheltenham press release stated the race has been renamed the Open Hunters’ Chase, which it claimed “is intended to strengthen the race’s identity”. Really? It achieves exactly the reverse, for its name is now like dozens of others. Fox hunting is banned, hence the change, but trail hunting is alive and well supported, and foxhounds remain an important and much loved breed. Why not the S J P Foxhound Hunters’ Chase or Trail Hunters’ Chase?