Nick Townsend talks to jockey Kieran Shoemark about his winning battles on the track and off it…
When Kieran Shoemark – invariably measured in his pronouncements – reflects with a wry smile “I’m a big fan of Frankie’s but we don’t share any personality traits.”
Few would dispute it. Indeed, racegoers are as unlikely to witness a flying dismount from the man who has replaced Dettori on the John and Thady Gosden riding roster – any more than they would have expected from Lester Piggott.
Shoemark nods in agreement. “No, that wouldn’t be my style.”
The flamboyant Dettori was, of course, a complete one-off. Yet, not for one second does that mean that his successor doesn’t possess the character, temperament and fortitude to impress his name on the sport – and maybe beyond in the coming years, as the Italian has both in and out of the saddle.
Shoemark’s ascent on the path that’s led to Clarehaven, the all-powerful Newmarket base of the champion trainer father and son combination, has been remarkable, particularly given a much-publicised stumble along the way.
As we sit outside the weighing room of Windsor racecoursee the day before the start of the Craven meeting, I ask him wheth-her, as an apprentice with Andrew Balding 10 seasons ago, whether he could have imagined scaling such heights?
“Well, yes, because I had a dream,” he says.
“I wanted to be at the top of my sport. But I believee I’m not there yet. I’ve still got some improving to do, a long way to go and a lot of races I’d like to win.
“So I believe this is my most icant year to really propel my career sign if- and I look forward to taking that. I have some very exciting horses to ride.”
He adds: “There’s a lot of exciting older horses that are staying in training, the likes of Emily Upjohn who I rode in the Sheema Classic (Group 1, at Meydan) in late March. I think that put her right for the Coronation Cup. I think she’s got a big year ahead. Another is Trawlerman in the staying division.”
The five-year-old Emily Upjohn, part-owned by Andrew Lloyd-Webber, was successful in last year’s event at Epsom, under Dettori, and is ante-post favourite for this year’s renewal. The six-year-old Trawlerman was undefeated last season, culminating in the British Champions Long Distance Cup at Ascot. Shoemark finished third on him in the Dubai Gold Cup at Meydan and his likely next target is the Yorkshire Cup.
Inspiral, whose nine wins include last year’s Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf, under Dettori, looks to be heading for the Lockinge Stakes at Newbury. “She missed the race last year, but hopefully she’s just on track for that.”
As for the younger horses, he adds: “This is an exciting time now, when we find out how the two-yearolds have progressed from two to three, and whether the dream’s still alive.” They include Eben Shaddad, third in last year’s Dewhurst Stakes.
Being in the midst of such quality, it would be easy for the man who has already partnered 12 Group winners, three of them Group 1s – William Jarvis’s Lady Bowthorpe in the 2021 Nassau Stakes at Goodwood, and Ed Walker’s Dreamloper twice last year at Longchamp – to already be giving free rein to his ambitions and be contemplating Classic victories ahead, even maybe a jockeys’ championship.
But, typical of the man, he insists: “I think I’m looking quite short term at the moment. This year is a breakthrough year for me. Of course, it’s very easy for me to sit here and say I want to win The Derby, I want to win The Arc de Triomphe. This year I want to win Group 1 races and I want to deliver for the owners and for John and Thady Gosden and the whole team at Clarehaven.”
The owners included the late Queen and now number The King and Queen Camilla. “It’s a privilege to be wearing those colours,” he says. “It’s pretty special, especially when you ride a winner for them. I haven’t had as many winners as I’d have liked to have had for them. I might have had half a dozen in the past.”
On the subject of succession, of a sort, we return to Shoemark’s admission to such exalted ranks on the departure (from British racing) of Dettori. He is well prepared for the inevitable comparisons that will be made between the Italian and himself, and insists: “I’m not going to change my personality. I’m my own person.
“I’m not the type of guy who has too many highs or lows. I like to stay relatively level. As a sportsman, that suits me in a way. We know this game has lots of ups and downs, so I try to keep as level as possible.”
He adds: “Obviously, I admire Frankie and he’s one of my sporting idols for what he’s achieved in the sport. If I could have half of his success that’s certainly my ambition.”
Shoemark places much emphasis on being part of a team. He heads a list of four on the Gosden roster of jockeys, the others being Robert Havlin, Benoit De La Sayette and Kieran O’Neill.
None are retained riders. As Gosden Snr said last year: “I haven’t retained a jockey since William Buick left to go to Godolphin and before that Frankie in the 1990s. Retained jockeys are out of fashion right now. That’s for an owner, not a trainer.”
But you see yourself as No1? He responds diplomatically: “I ride a lot of those good horses in the mornings so I suppose when you’re doing that you half expect to be riding them in the afternoon…”
He expanded on that theme. “Kieran, Benoit and Rab Havlin, they’re all huge team players. That’s something that’s really struck me since I started riding out there and impressed me at the same time.
“Of course, when I first went in there I was a little bit apprehensive, but they couldn’t have been more welcoming to me, and helpful. Rab may ride a horse in the morning that I’d never ridden but I’m due to ride a race on in two days’ time and he’ll come up to me and tell me everything about that horse.”
He adds of the veteran Havlin who has been with John Gosden for around 25 years: “I really admire him. He’s had a remarkable career, a long career and a successful career. He rides stacks of winners every year, rides all through the winter, all through the summer, rides out every morning. He rarely takes a holiday.”
There can be few jockeys with a stronger support network than Shoemark. His father Ian and grandfather Bill were both successful jump jockeys after starting out on the Flat. Though his elder brother Conor followed them in that code, retiring from the saddle in 2020, Kieran, the lighter of the pair, opted for the Flat.
“My family very much takes a back seat,” he says. “My father wouldn’t necessarily text me and say ‘well done’ but I know for certain he would have watched the race.”
His father runs a fish and chip shop in Stow-on-the-Wold in Gloucestershire, where Shoemark was raised. “I think he’s had the shop since I was born – so 28 years,” he says, before adding: “Well, he does for the time being, but I think he’s looking to sell it, so if anyone reading this wants to buy it I’m sure he’d be willing to have a conversation!” His father is also a retained firefighter.
“He’d be my biggest supporter behind the scenes – as are my mother (Niamh) and immediate family. My grandfather Bill rode a good few winners over jumps. He still lives in Stow with my grandmother Pam. They’re big supporters, too.”
Oh, and in addition, Peter, his uncle and his wife Sarah both work in the office at Clarehaven. “You could say I’ve got an ‘in’ there,” he says with a laugh.
Last but not least is his girlfriend is Sophie Kavanagh (a PR account manager for JSC Communications, dealing with Tattersalls, amongst others). “She’s very much involved in the industry – her family are owners and breeders.”
He adds: “Sophie’s a great sounding-board for me. She knows the game extremely well. I like to bounce a few ideas off her. There are a lot of people around me who have a great knowledge of the sport. I’m very lucky to be in this position.”
Ask him what his lessons his experiences have taught him since starting out in 2014 and he declares: “To never bottle things up”. He adds:
“In the past, I’ve obviously had my own troubles. I’ve overcome those by speaking out about them.”
It was in 2017 that Shoemark agonisingly lost out by just one winner to David Egan in a frenetic battle to become champion apprentice. It was a year in which he also enjoyed a Royal Ascot winner, on Roger Charlton’s Atty Pearse in the King George VI Handicap.
With his career on a decidedly upward trajectory, it was at Lingfield in late June the following year that the jockey suffered six broken ribs and a punctured lung and he was sidelined for two months, It was a period in which he told me when we last spoke that he had filled with “other activities”. At the end of the same year he was handed a six-month suspension for testing positive for a banned substance. In 2019, he admitted publicly that he was a recovering alcoholic and had attended AA meetings.
Admirably, he offered no excuses for that lifestyle, and made no attempt to attribute it to the stress of the job or the sacrifices demanded to maintain a racing weight. He currently rides at 8st 8lb.
When I question whether he harbours any regrets about his candour then, the jockey immediately retorts: “No, no, it’s a helping method for me. I like talking about it. When people ask me about it, whether it be in an interview scenario or someone asking for help, I’m not ashamed of it at all. My life’s been changed around for the better.”
He adds: “I don’t regret anything, you know. My life couldn’t be any different today. I’m proud of the person I’ve become and how I’ve overcome it all. People reach out to me about it, whether directly or whether they send me a message, or it could be on social media.
“That helps me too because I mightn’t have talked about it for a couple of weeks and someone reaches out and I end up talking about it. We all know that talking about a problem can often help.”
Perhaps most crucially, he states: “It’s almost five and a half years now since I’ve had a drink. I take my recovery very seriously.”
The rewards are potentially great, but this is a tough life physically: riding work virtually from first light, then driving sometimes long distances to meetings before cajoling half a ton of horseflesh to victory, hopefully. Rarely a four-day week and never working from home. Did he ever wake up and consider throwing a sickie rather than contemplate, say, a night meeting at Southwell?
Shoemark smiles and says: “That could easily be the case, but not when you’ve good horses to ride. When you know you’ve got a nice maiden or a nice horse in a pattern race it’s easy to get out of bed.
“As long as you’re riding winners, you don’t mind going to work. It can be frustrating if you’re not having winners, but when things go well this is the best job in the world.”
For exclusive stories and all the detailed Racing news you need, subscribe to the Racing Ahead website, digital edition, or magazine from as little as 8p a day.
