Million-winning stable lad to gamble on his US dream

The West Cork stable lad who scooped £1m (€1.24m) on a bet at Cheltenham in March has followed his childhood dream of setting up his own stable.

Conor Murphy is coming to terms with the “really, really tough” decision he took to leave Nicky Henderson’s yard in Lambourne outside London and set up in Louisville, Kentucky.

From Ballineen, Conor scooped the jackpot when he predicted five winners during one of the world’s best-loved racing festivals, but now he is set for an even bigger gamble — to try and establish himself in the ultra-competitive US flat-racing circuit.

He hopes to move to Louisville to start his new venture in July.

“There’s huge sadness around the yard this week,” the 28-year-old admitted as he left the yard for the last time yesterday. “I’ve made a lot of good friends here and it’s going to be very tough to leave such a place. You’ll go a long way to find a better yard of jump horses in Ireland, England, France, wherever.

“You have the classiest horses in the game here so it’s really, really tough to leave that behind, and it’ll be especially tough to leave Finian’s Rainbow, because I’ve ridden him from day one since he came in. “He’s run 14 times and won 10, so it’ll be very, very tough. He was probably the only thing that was making me consider staying because I’ve been with him all his career, and when you’re working day in, day out with a horse like that, it sounds sad but it becomes like your best friend. I’ll miss the whole place but the time is right to move on.”

Though he made up his mind to leave in Decem-ber, it was only last month that he dropped the bombshell to Henderson.

“He was a bit disappointed I was leaving but the time is right now. I always wanted to go training myself. Ideally, I wanted to train either at home or over here because the racing over here or at home is the best anywhere in the world but it costs too much to set up. It would cost everything I have to set up and the prize money is shocking.”

The former St Brogan’s College, Bandon, student has a headstart, however, because he’s financially better off than most who build from the bottom up, and he has also worked in the farm where he’s soon to be taking charge.

“I’ll be based in a little farm called Skylight training centre, based roughly about 25 miles outside Louisville in Kentucky. It’s a beautiful farm — only four trainers altogether. It’s got a lovely little race track in the middle with a beautiful pro-ride surface — the only place in North America with that kind of surface which makes it very unique. It’s got paddocks and the whole lot, it’s a beautiful set-up, great for horses, so I can’t wait to get over there.”