Ruby Walsh: This sport can give so much, but it isn’t always kind
WINNING FEELING: Michael O'Sullivan savours the moment after riding Embassy Gardens to victory at Tramore on New Year's Day. Picture: Healy Racing
Life is a roller coaster. We know it is. If you're a jump jockey, however, it’s the one at the far end of the fairground where only a few choose to line up, and the lucky ones enjoy. So, why do they take the ticket and board the carriage when they know the safety harness might not work?
Why do they want to be the ones hurtling towards a double loop with no idea if the cart will stay on the tracks? Why are they the ones who get fired into the sky, crash down to earth, yet rejoin the queue as quickly as they can? And why do they ride it to the end only to want to start again?
Why do they stand, stare, and watch until they are tall enough to get on board, and why has it not scared them before they start? Why is riding the runaway roller coaster the only thing they dream of? The one thing they want and something no one can stop them from doing? Why don't they believe they will be the next one who can no longer queue up, and why can’t they see it's never going to be a life spent in Disneyland with a golden, fast-pass ticket?
Why do they take the knockbacks from the ticket conductors who decide what days they can ride and what days they are only allowed to watch, and why do they only ever want to be the one sitting in the front car, leading the way?
Why? Because it's their dream, they love it, they want it, and once they have felt it, they can't let it go. My father-in-law always tells me that youth is wasted on the young, and he is right in many ways, but youth was never wasted on a jump jockey. The energy, ambition, and drive of youth pushes those who dream of riding racehorses into a path filled with danger but coated in sugar. The thrill of the speed hooks them, the ecstasy of winning delights them, and the pain of falling or losing only ignites the passion to do it all again.
Micheal O’Sullivan is one of those who chose to get on board. His background is the backbone of this sport, and whatever he learnt and saw as a boy, his dream was to ride the jockey's roller coaster. His cart had the usual trajectory as it pulled away from the platform, but as it started to climb, it flew up the first hill and landed on Marine Nationale. A youngster had to become a man overnight, and this cool, stylish, sharp conditional belied his youth in the Royal Bond and had his eyes set on the prize.
On the morning of March 14, 2023, I stood outside the Cheltenham racecourse stable yard in the unloading area, talking to Charlie Swan. A tall, lean figure hovered behind us before approaching, looking for advice. He didn't want to know how he should ride his horse or what we thought of the race; he wanted to know about the track. He wanted any small pointers that he felt he should know.
Charlie voiced a few ideas, and I chipped in with one or two more. He thanked us for our time and left. Five hours later, I joked with Charlie Swan that it was like Micheal O’Sullivan had an earpiece in as his execution of what we suggested was delivered on point. Marine Nationale nailed Facile Vega, and Micheal was a Supreme hero.
His cleverness to ask, his manners of approach, and the general vibe he exudes have made him a likeable man. He is quiet but confident, mannerly yet cheeky. But a roller coaster goes up and down, and his ride is no different. The man in the cart has never changed, even if his circumstances did, and when one job went, all he looked for was the next ticket to get back on board the roller coaster.
On Thursday last, at Thurles, his cart was one that derailed.
The care and assistance are unrecognisable from when I took my ticket to follow the heroes of my youth — the people I watched ride the roller coaster until I was tall enough to play with them — the people I dreamed of being.
This sport can give so much, but it isn’t always kind. The men and women you watch daily are following a dream around a fairground for grown-ups. They don’t always get it right because they are human, and with humans come emotions, feelings, and relatives.
People who enjoy what these people do and feel all their pain, people who support them and look after them and people who look up to them and watch them ride the roller coaster until they are old enough to play.
Right now, Micheal lies in Cork University Hospital fighting, relying on every sinew of his fabric to keep him that way.
All those who have ridden his roller coaster without ever getting on board are with him now, and so are the rest of us.
It's an individual’s ride, but no one is ever on their own. The roller coaster ride is meant to stop at the platform, and everyone is meant to get off smiling, so say a prayer for the O’Sullivans and hope they can come away from this ride smiling.
