Our questions are answered by the former leading Irish jockey who is now a highly respected TV pundit
As one door shut, another one has opened for Fran Berry. After being forced into premature retirement by a neck injury, the former jockey has become a highly respected figure in the racing media, as both presenter and pundit on Racing TV in Britain and Ireland.
Berry, 42, whose father Frank was a ten-time champion jump jockey in Ireland and is now J P McManus’s racing manager, enjoyed a successful riding career of his own after getting his first licence aged 15. “I rode my first winner on the May Bank Holiday at Navan and was back in school on Tuesday,” he recalls.
Berry rode nearly 1,300 winners, including at the Cheltenham and Aintree Festivals over jumps, but made his name on the Flat, finishing runner-up in the Irish Flat jockeys’ championship on several occasions.
He moved to England to become stable jockey for Ralph Beckett until injury brought a halt to his stay. “I broke bones in my neck in a fall in Wolverhampton in January 2019,” he explains. “The damage was quite extensive and the surgeon advised it was not safe to continue riding.”
Berry was already writing his own blog and was invited to guest on Racing TV’s Friday night coverage of racing from Dundalk. He eventually became a more permanent fixture after moving back home to Co Kildare after three years in England. He spent regular winters riding in Japan from 2010, winning several big races among his 70-plus winners.
Which racing figure past or present do you most admire?
Jockey-wise it would have to be Mick Kinane. He was a total role model for any young rider but particularly young Irish riders. He broke the mould in that as an Irish-based rider he broke the international barrier with his successes in Hong Kong and worldwide.
The way he showcased the standard of Irish riding had a huge influence on the culture in Irish racing. Johnny Murtagh, Pat Smullen, everyone gained from what Mick Kinane did. He was the best rider I rode against on a Monday, Tuesday or a Saturday or a Sunday.
Which is your favourite venue, and race, anywhere in the world?
My favourite track is Nakayama in Japan. I loved riding there – once I got the hang of it. During my time in Japan my home tracks were in the Tokyo area but every January you would start in Nakayama. It took a good bit of knowing. It’s only a mile [1600m] around but I found it very enjoyable to ride around. Coupled with the very enthusiastic racing fans, I felt very comfortable. Every win I had there I enjoyed.
I was very lucky to ride four winners at Royal Ascot where I won the Ascot Stakes three times on horses trained by people I had good associations with. It might not have been the race of the week, but it meant a lot to myself and the connections and usually led to a good summer for me.
Who is your favourite racehorse and why?
Without a doubt, Sea The Stars. I was based with John Oxx during the time of Sea The Stars and was lucky enough to ride him a lot in the mornings when Mick Kinane wasn’t around.
To see how John Oxx handled him, the way he brought him along and the way the horse improved and continued to improve all the way through was amazing. It’s only when you look back in time you realise how exceptional he was and what he did in that golden year of 2009 to win the Guineas, Derby, Eclipse, Irish Champion Stakes and then onto the Arc. It’s a tremendous feat and I am not sure it gets enough credit.
Mick Kinane was very clever in the way he rode him. He only ever just did enough to win. Despite all that Ballydoyle threw at them, with some rough-and-tumble tactics at times, and the unfortunate time he was withdrawn from the Irish Derby when the track was over-watered yet won the Eclipse the following week, it was a fantastic journey.
For all that he was so good in winning the Arc, when he got himself and Mick out of trouble two furlongs out, the best was yet to come from him as a four-year-old were he to be kept in training, but that was never going to happen. He lives across the road from me now at Gilltown Stud.
What is your fondest memory in racing?
There are a lot of things that stick in the mind, but on a personal level it would be winning the G3 Gladness Stakes at the Curragh in 2006 on Common World, my first winner back from a neck injury in August the previous year.
It had been a really tough ten months out of the saddle. To win a G3 on my home track where the accident had occurred, with all of my family there was fantastic, and very emotional as well. My brother Alan winning the G1 Champion Bumper at Punchestown on Refinement in 2005 was also a huge day.
If you could change one thing in racing what would it be?
Covid had a positive impact in one way in that everyone was a lot more open in their communications with the public. We are living in an information age and I think racing needs to keep pushing that forward and using it as a way of self-promoting.
The more the public is involved the better. Japan is the perfect example. The public have embraced racing through getting better insight into the sport whether it is the training of the horses, their weights and the profiles of jockeys. They sell the sport better. I think we can do a lot better to make racing more accessible.
Fran Berry was speaking to Jon Lees
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