Ruby Walsh: 2021 belongs to Rachael Blackmore and Kellie Harrington

Blackmore has achieved things in 2021 that are milestones in sport, not just horse racing, because she didn’t dominate the women’s section of a sport, she dominated the sport of horse racing on the biggest stage

A simple unseat from Jason The Militant in the Aintree Hurdle must have had Rachael Blackmore thinking her luck was out that week, yet she delivered the most significant success of them all on Minella Times. Picture: Healy Racing

After racing finishes in Navan this afternoon, Rachael Blackmore will make her way to the RTÉ studios in Donnybrook for the Sports Personality of the Year Awards. Were this not an Olympic year — and it shouldn’t be — she would be sure to collect the top honour.

It is not an award racing wins very often, Barry Geraghty being the only jockey to have won it, having done so in 2003 when he, too, was leading rider at the Cheltenham Festival and won the Grand National aboard Monty’s Pass. But even he will see the magnitude of the difference between his and Rachael’s achievements.