Trainer Profile

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Colm Murphy first came to attention in racing as a successful amateur rider. As well as his riding, he worked in Aidan O’Brien's office at Ballydoyle, dealing with entries, declarations and other administration work. Having taken out his own license to train in 2000, Murphy didn’t have to wait long to come across a horse of a lifetime in the shape of Brave Inca.

A legendary hurdler, he won 10 Grade 1 races, most notably a never-to-be-forgotten victory in the Champion Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival in 2006. Feathard Lady was another high-class horse in Murphy's care at the time but she never raced again after her win in the Grade 1 Christmas Hurdle at Sandown in December 2005 and was retired having won each of her seven starts.

As Brave Inca’s powers were fading, Murphy gained a new stable star in Big Zeb who recorded six Grade 1 wins including the Queen Mother Champion Chase at the Cheltenham Festival in 2010. After a couple of quiet years, Murphy enjoyed something of a resurgence in the 2015/2016 season and enjoyed big handicap chase success with both Empire Of Dirt and Marlbrook. Empire Of Dirt gave the County Wexford trainer his fourth Cheltenham Festival success when taking the Brown Advisory & Merriebelle Stable Plate Handicap Chase at in 2016.

On September 23, 2016 Murphy took the racing world by surprise when announcing his intention to retire from the training ranks. He soon joined the Turf Club (later the IHRB) as a racing official but in May, 2019 again made the headlines when deciding to renew his training licence.