Trainers

Between 1994/95 and 1996/97, Michael Attwater enjoyed a brief, but not entirely unsuccessful, career as a National Hunt jockey. He rode his first winner, Sophie May, trained by Mark Dixon at Ermyn Lodge, Epsom, in a juvenile novices’ hurdle at dearly departed Folkestone on December 30, 1994. Attwater remained a conditional jockey for Gary Moore at Cisswood Racing Stables in Lower Beeding, West Sussex for the whole of his short riding career, but over the next three seasons, rode four more winners, from a total of just 27 rides, at a not unhealthy strike rate of around 19%.

However, he grew too tall and too heavy to continue race riding and subsequently joined John Akehust at South Hatch Stables, back in Epsom, as head lad. Attwater began his training career with a salaried appointment in Nottinghamshire, before brief spells in Lambourn, Berkshire and at the Racecourse Stables in Epsom on his way to his current home at Tattenham Corner Stables. There, he holds a combined licence and trains around 40 horses at any given time.

On the Flat, Attwater enjoyed his most successful season, numerically, in 2017, when he saddled 25 winners from 237 runners, at a strike rate of 11% and, financially, in 2022, when he amassed £209,613 in total prize money. His occasional forays into National Hunt racing have proved less successful, with his sole winner for 57 runners, Sheila’s Fancy, springing a 33/1 in a handicap hurdle at Fontwell in January 2019.

Social: https://www.facebook.com/p/Attwater-racing-100057663900540/

Email: attwaterracing@hotmail.co.uk

Based, since 2018, at Marlborough House Stables on the Old Station Road in the heart of Newmarket, Suffolk, Louise Allan has held as training licence, in her own right, since 2011. Brought up on the family farm at Thorney, near Peterborough, Cambridgeshire, Allan graduated from the fields of pony club, hunting and showjumping to become a successful amateur jockey, in point-to-points and under Flat and National Rules. Indeed, she continued to ride work, first for local trainer Pam Sly, to she was assistant, and later for David Elsworth, in Newmarket, while she trained a small string of point-to-pointers at Thornley and at Egerton Stud, respectively, before taking out full training licence.

Very much a ‘hands on’ trainer, who rides out every day, Allan holds a dual-purpose licence, but winners for what is, after all, one of the smallest yards in Newmarket, have been few and far between. In fact, since the start of the 2017/18 National Hunt season, she has trained just a single winner in that sphere, from 74 runners, and just eight winners on the Flat, from 165 runners. At the time of writing, in the current Flat and National Hunt seasons, she is 0-5 in each, and has amassed just £4,021 in place money.

website: https://www.louiseallanracing.co.uk

Email: louiseallan1@hotmail.co.uk

Based in the village of Coverham, near Middleham, in the Yorkshire Dales in North Yorkshire, Liam Bailey is a relatively recent addition to the training ranks, having first taken out a licence in 2019. He leads a young team for Foulrice Park Racing, an operation created by Colin and Ailsa Stirling in 2010, which moved to a permanent home in Middleham in 2013.

He holds a dual-purpose licence, but, aside from three winners under National Hunt Rules in 2019/20, all of his other victories have come on the Flat. In that sphere, Bailey has yet to break into double-figures in any calendar year, but, with six winners in 2024, so far – from 36 runners, at a creditable 17% strike rate – looks well on the way to the highest seasonal tally of his career to date.

In May 2021, Bailey made the tabloid headlines for all the wrong reasons, after being fined £4,500 following what was described as a ‘ truly shocking incident involving appalling language, violent and threatening behaviour’ towards a female member of stable staff, who was late for work. The incident took place in October 2019, during his first season in the training ranks, of which he later said, ‘…we were struggling, she knew we were short of staff, there was no way we could afford to lose her.’

Social: https://www.instagram.com/liambailey30/

Email: liambailey_foulricefarm@hotmail.com

Former point-to-point trainer Sam Allwood has held a full, exclusively National Hunt, licence since June 2019. Based at Church Farm, in the village of Ash Magna, just south of Whitchurch, in North Shropshire, Allwood is an unassuming, but hard-working, handler, who has been lauded as one to watch in the professional training ranks. Prior to being granted his licence, he had saddled just one winner under Rules, former point-to-pointer Mantou, in a novices’ hunters’ chase at Sedgefield, in April 2018.

However, in his new capacity, he hit the ground running in 2019/20, saddling nine winners from 43 runners, at a 21% strike rate, and amassed just over £49,000 in total prize money. His biggest earner that year was the Kayf Tara mare Sheneededtherun, owned by the Sam Allwood Racing Club, who contributed four wins, from six runs, and over £28,000 to the respective seasonal totals. Allwood has yet to match that performance, with just four, four and two winners in three subsequent seasons and just one, so far, in 2023/24. That said, some 59, or roughly 20%, of his 293 runners in that period finished second or third, so it may be fair to say that the yard could do with a slight change of fortune.

website: https://samallwood.co.uk/

Social: https://www.facebook.com/SamAllwoodPointtoPoint

Email: office@samallwood.co.uk