Bryan Cooper has quickly been recognised as one of the most progressive conditional jockeys in the weighing room. He is improving all the time and is right in the mix in the race for the title of Champion Conditional Rider.
Principal Trainers: Dessie Hughes, Tom Cooper
Notable Win: Connacht Tribune Handicap Chase (Banna Man 2010)
Early Days
Bryan is certainly bred to excel in the racing industry, being a son of Tom Cooper, the trainer of Cheltenham Festival winners Total Enjoyment and Forpadydeplasterer. He cut his teeth of the showjumping and pony racing circuits before being sent up to that superb nurturer of precocious riding talent, Kevin Prendergast. He only weighed seven-and-a-half stone when starting out with Prendergast and took his first racecourse ride at the Curragh on September 14th 2008. He continued to take regular mounts without getting off the mark in the year that followed, but a growth spurt made a career as a Flat jockey look impractical and his attentions were soon switched to jumping. He took his first ride over hurdles almost a year to the day after his first ride on the Flat and it didn’t take long for him to get off the mark.
Jumping Success
Riding his father’s Rossdara in a maiden hurdle at Clonmel on October 29th 2009, Cooper produced a polished performance to guide her to an authoritative success. Having switched to the Dessie Hughes yard on the advice of Prendergast soon after, Cooper soon began to reap the rewards. That said, not long after he joined Hughes, he broke his wrist in a fall at Gowran Park and missed eight weeks of action. However, once he had returned, Cooper continued to progress over the remainder of the season, riding three more winners, but it wasn’t until the commencement of the 2010/11 season that Cooper really took off.
A Break-Out Season
His impact was immediate in the new season, with him riding the Bill Harney-trained Bruach Na Mara to success at his local track at Killarney in the opening weeks of the season. Two winners in as many days for Dessie Hughes followed less than a week later. The strong run of form continued through the summer months, with him riding a total of six winners between June and July, despite missing over three weeks due to a collarbone injury in between, but the highlight of his summer period came at the Galway Festival. Riding the Thomond O.Mara-trained Banna Man in the valuable Connacht Tribune Handicap Chase, Cooper gave the tricky sort a very patient ride and had two lengths to spare over Arkendale at the line. Less than a fortnight after that memorable success, Cooper rode his first winner on the Flat on the Eoin Doyle-trained Dusty Trail in a handicap at Tramore.
Doubling Up
Cooper very much continued his momentum into September, riding his first double just days into the new month at Kilbeggan. He continued to ride winners in the months that followed, including in a valuable handicap hurdle at Naas on the Dessie Hughes-trained Grangeclare Gold at Naas in mid-October. While he, like everyone else, was slowed down the frost and snow during the winter months, Cooper really hit top form from February onwards, maintaining a remarkable strike rate in the months that followed. His boss Dessie Hughes provided him with a few notable successes such as Definite Class in a valuable novice hurdle at Fairyhouse in February and better again, a first Listed race win on Coscorrig in the John Fowler Memorial European Breeders Fund Mares Chase at the Fairyhouse Easter Festival.
As the season draws to a close, Cooper holds an insurmountable lead in the race for the title of Champion Conditional Rider and if he continues to progress at the rate he has since the beginning of the 2010/11 season, he looks to have a very bright future ahead of him.
Info supplied by Horse Racing Ireland - Updated May 2011
