Leading amateur Sweeney calls it a day
The 10-year-old, trained by the rider’s father, Rodger, won the Foxhunter Chase in 2012 and 2013, but was pulled up when bidding for the treble last month.
Having struggled with his weight for a number of years and having only recently taken up a job as a racecourse cameraman for Irish TV company IRIS, Sweeney feels now is the right time to call it a day.
He said: “It was coming eventually and I’ve a good job now with IRIS and I just felt I couldn’t carry on doing both.
“I wasn’t going to be able to ride out as much as I had been doing, and it would be a struggle to keep by fitness up. It wouldn’t be fair on whatever horses I was going to ride and I thought they’d be better with a fitter jockey on their backs. I’ve also had a constant struggle with my weight all my life and the older I’m getting the harder it is to get the weight off from the summer grass! Working with IRIS is great as you still get to go racing and still get to meet up with the same characters.
“I hope I’ll be able to be as successful during my new career as I was with the riding. I’ll certainly enjoy it, I’ll just be at the other end of the camera.Salsify probably gave me the two greatest days of my riding career. To have success as a family like that in Cheltenham doesn’t happen very often. I also won the Foxhunter on Sleeping Night for Paul Nicholls and I rode plenty of other good horses,”
