THOSE who work outdoors, particularly with animals, are made of sterner stuff, which was particularly apparent during this week’s cold snap. Success is a great motivator though, and winners are capable of warming bones better than any liquor, as the in-form Denis Hogan can testify to.

“Big time,” the trainer agrees, speaking a few days after a smart double at Cork, and days away from Frankie John stepping up to Grade 1 level. “It makes the whole thing easier for everyone. Staff are happier. I’m happier.

“When you do have a problem, it’s no big deal. But when things are going the other way and a horse gets injured, or something like that, it’s like the end of the world, you know? It’s so different; when things are going good, you’re positive and everything is rosy and problems seem small, but when it’s going bad, it’s hard to see the positives.”

Cousin Kate was the highlight of Saturday’s double, as the Liam Mulryan-owned mare gained her second consecutive win in taking fashion. Her progression has been a huge lift for the Mulryan family, as she was bought by Liam’s son Hugh, who tragically passed away last year.

“I was just so thrilled for the Mulryan family,” Hogan said, reflecting on the Maxios mare’s latest win. “They’ve had a tough year. After Hughie’s funeral, Liam sent me down this filly and said, ‘see if she’s any good’.

“He said she had spent last winter with the Skeltons, and she was probably very weak and didn’t show much. We won an unplaced maiden in Tramore, it was a lovely start, and because it was an unplaced maiden, we got probably a reasonable mark.

“She went to Gowran, and she ran into another good mare of Willie’s, and was just beat. From there, I got her beat in Tramore [laughs] - we won’t talk about that - but she came out at Christmas, and won a mares’ handicap well.

“We took a gamble going back quick after Limerick, but she was very well, and we just thought the race suited. She seemed to improve a ton for drier ground at Cork, and we claimed seven after getting eight pounds. Eoin Staples gave her a lovely ride.”

Cousin Kate’s new mark of 123 enables plans to run in a mares’ handicap hurdle at the Dublin Racing Festival later this month. Hopefully, she can continue to lift the Mulryan family’s spirits and advertise the talents of the late Hugh.

“Hughie was mad to become a bloodstock agent,” Hogan explains. “He had done plenty of buying for me, and all year since his passing, horses that he had bought years previously, have all won. He was a good judge.”

Day to remember

Frankie John’s recent win at the Leopardstown Christmas Festival was particularly sweet for other reasons, as the game grey rallied to beat a Gordon Elliott-trained favourite, finished 13 lengths clear of the third, and did so in the colours of Hogan’s mother, with Hogan himself in the saddle.

“It was massive,” Hogan remarks. “It was more relief as well, because I knew that with a maiden hurdle, at Christmas, at Leopardstown, you’re looking at graded horses.

“I knew it was going to be a hard one, but I thought we had the horse to be involved, it just depended on what we were taking on the day. Then to do it in our family colours as well, who own half with John Mahon... Those are the days you do it for.”

Frankie John was bought by Hogan with the intention to resell, and stood connections a pretty penny, having cost €110,000 at the Tattersalls Ireland Derby Sale.

“From the first time he cantered, he just had natural ability and was a beautiful mover,” the Tipperary man recalls. “I first saw him a few weeks before the sale, and he wasn’t on my list because he had been a €100,000 foal, so I just thought he was going to be way above our budget.

“But on the day, I kept an eye on him, and I stretched a bit further than we were supposed to. But I was never sorry for spending so much on him. I’ve learned over the years that I’ve been more sorry for buying cheaper ones that I didn’t want, but just bought because they were the right price. I’ve learned a lot from buying wrong ones.”

Frankie John rewarded Hogan’s fate when winning first time out at Boulta, a performance that saw him sell for £275,000, but fate had other ideas, and the grey was returned to Hogan for a foot issue.

“I’ve been disappointed before when horses have been thrown back for veterinary issues, but I wasn’t a bit disappointed when I got the call to say he was coming back, because I just thought we still have a horse that’s worth every bit of what he made, and he can only go forward.

“Look, it’s worked out and, touch wood, if he stays in one piece, I think there’s a lot more to come.”

Since our initial chat, Frankie John finished fifth in the Grade 1 Ballymore Novice Hurdle at Naas, with Hogan reporting: “The ground wasn’t what it was called; it was soft to heavy, gluey ground.

“If I knew it was going to be old ground and dead, in hindsight, I probably wouldn’t have brought him there, but he’s run well and there’s no harm done. You either handle that ground or you don’t. I thought we’d have more fresh ground; I’m a bit disappointed that it was run on old ground.”

Plans remain open, with Hogan commenting: “We’ll probably give him a few weeks, and we’ll see where we go. There’s a chance we could go for a handicap as well.”

Sell to survive

The initial investment and subsequent return of Frankie John were made somewhat easier by the profit previously realised by Mahon’s Way, an €80,000 store that resold for £360,000 after impressing in a four-year-old maiden at Lisronagh.

Hogan wasn’t associated with top lots prior to that, but the trainer saw consigning as a necessary business decision, he explains. “As you know, we’ve been training secondhand goods since I started,” he says.

“We’ve had some great results with some, let’s say, cast-offs from some big studs, but having done that for years, I realised that you can only get so far with some of these. The game’s gone so expensive, for owners, trainers, everyone, that we needed to be getting a sale, basically to survive and to be able to buy more stock. The bottom line is that training fees just about cover the cost. So, we need to be getting a sale every year, really, just to make a living.

“Unfortunately, a lot of the big owners are with the few big trainers at the top and that’s where the horses end up. Which is great to have as a seller - it’s great to have them there to buy, but as a trainer, it’s hard to hold on to these horses.”

Hogan is far from the first trainer, be they flat or National Hunt, to say that trading is a vital lifeline. Like most, Hogan believes that Irish prize money is to blame. “We haven’t just lost pointers, we’ve sold a lot of horses that haven’t even won, they’ve just run well here,” he explains.

“They’ve all gone abroad to where they can race for four or five times more prize money. I do think Ireland is falling behind. It was good prize money, 10, 15, 20 years ago, but it has not moved since I started training [in 2009]. So, I do think it needs to be looked at. Look, it’s a lot easier said than done. Where’s the money going to come from? But I do think we’re falling behind.

“I think the Curragh have done great, in that they haven’t got a race worth less than €20,000. I feel that should follow through everywhere else. We’re grateful to get what we can, but to keep Ireland at the top of the tree and to keep the owners here, I think that it needs to be looked at.”

Diamonds in the rough

Hogan has done well buying from other yards, though as he alluded to earlier, they lack the obvious appeal of those he sells, with the majority considered castoffs from larger operations. The best horse he ever trained, Sceptical, was bought by owner James McAuley unraced from Godolphin for £2,800, and went on to win the Woodlands Stakes impressively before placing in the Diamond Jubilee Stakes and July Cup.

Unfortunately, we’ll never know what could have been, as the four-year-old was fatally injured during exercise. “That was an awful shame that we lost him,” Hogan reflects. “But again, we bought him with some issues, which we did our best to iron out, but unfortunately, we ended up losing him in an accident on the gallops.”

Make A Challenge was another flagbearer for the yard, winning five listed sprints and a premier handicap at the Curragh, as well as finishing second in two Group 2s. He was picked up by Hogan and Colm Sharkey for £6,500 from Godolphin, the same source as current inmate Tassarolo, a 2,000gns purchase that has won three under both codes, and 87-rated flat horse Nezeeh, bought for 3,000gns.

Tithonus was bought from John Oxx for €4,200 and won three premier handicaps. Of Hogan’s current string, Midnight Horizon looks a smart filly after winning her last two starts. Now rated 86, the daughter of Sioux Nation was bought by Hogan and Sharkey for 20,000gns.

It turns out that Hogan didn’t have such grand expectations when he first began buying ‘secondhand goods’, as he calls them. “Basically, we used to target the horses-in-training sales just to buy winners for syndicates and owners,” he explains. “If they won a 0-65, then we were happy, because we hadn’t spent much on them.

“That was where we started; we had a lot of luck, a lot of winners bought, and then we came on Make A Challenge. Again, we would have been happy to win a little handicap, but he turned out to be a group horse eventually.”

Risk taker

These horses don’t come cheap for no reason, though, with veterinary issues generally the reason for their low prices. “I’m a big gambler when it comes to sales, I’m like an addict,” Hogan says with a laugh.

“I’ll take a chance on most. There aren’t too many things I’ll shy away from at a price, maybe tendons, obviously. Especially if I know the horse has ability, or if the horse has a big pedigree. Maybe he’s young and hasn’t been given all the time he needs.

“We will rehome or move on a lot of them, and we’re happy to do that. If they haven’t cost much money, it’s no big deal. But obviously, if we pay higher-end money, you’re expected to get a result from them.”

Given that many don’t work out, numbers are key to striking lucky, Hogan adds: “I suppose we buy 10 to 20 every year, easily, between us buying, and owners buying themselves. In the autumn, our numbers go up massively between yearlings and the horses-in-training sales. We could probably go up by 30 or 40 horses all of a sudden, but we don’t really do much buying for the rest of the year.”

One horse with issues, who has worked out, is the 100-rated Tyson Fury, bought by Hogan out of the Richard Spencer yard for 9,000gns. The Iffraaj gelding won and placed in a premier handicap for Hogan, brought them to Royal Ascot but missed the 2025 turf season. The now nine-year-old proved you can teach an old dog new tricks, when finishing fourth on hurdle debut at Leopardstown on St Stephen’s Day.

“He’s a horse we really like,” his trainer comments. “He ran a massive race on his first run over hurdles at Leopardstown, behind the Supreme Novice favourite, and it looks like he could have a good future.

“He did have some issues with bleeding, and he seems to have overcome them. So, he’s a prime example of a horse that had a rating, had ability, and lost his way a little. Again, I took a gamble on the day; some people told me I was mad buying a horse that had bled on more than one occasion, but at the money, I was happy to take a chance and it worked out.”

Another horse capable of making their presence felt in 2026 is Sarahmae, who placed in two premier handicaps last season as a three-year-old. The three-time winner was bought back for €44,000 in November, as Hogan explains: “We wanted 50 for her on the day. We feel that there’s a premier handicap in her next season. She might get blacktype.”

Bought as a yearling for €20,000, the Ten Sovereigns filly was co-bred by Paul Shanahan’s Lynch Bages. Shanahan has become involved in a number of horses in Hogan’s yard in recent years, along with other relatively new owners, including Justin Carthy, Timmy Hyde and Patrick O’Brien.

Turned a corner

On recruiting owners, Hogan commented: “Working at the sales and mingling and meeting people; I don’t do enough of that, and I think every trainer should be at the sales. I’ve probably got stock by looking at stock. I think when you show some interest, I think breeders or consigners respect that; if they’re looking for a trainer, you are on the list. I’ve met some great people through the sales.

“Charlie Swan has been very good to me throughout my career as a jockey and then as a trainer, he’s introduced me to some great people. Justin Carthy has done similar; he introduced me to Patrick O’Brien, who’s very keen to build a string, and he’s got some nice horses. Hopefully we’re lucky for him this year.”

When Hogan was last interviewed by The Irish Field back in 2019, he spoke candidly about being burned by a bad debtor, but has encountered different challenges since then. “I’ve got some brilliant owners these days,” he says. “Not only have we built up our owners, but we’ve also built up a good team of staff in the last year or so.

“Thank God, the last few years have been good and I don’t know if I should bring it up or not, but I suppose that case that hung over me for a couple of years with that claiming race, it was tough.

“It dragged on, and I suppose people talk and speculate. It didn’t do me any good, but I’m delighted that things are rocking and rolling again, and we can move on.”

The case that Hogan refers to is the IHRB’s investigation into the running and riding of Yuften, who finished second to stablemate Tony The Gent in a Dundalk claimer in March 2020. In November 2023, the IHRB formally closed the long-running case, confirming that there were no adverse findings against anyone involved.

Training can be a challenging enough job without such incidents, with the industry quick to forget your achievements, but slow to forget bad news. As the saying goes, you’re only as good as your last winner, which Hogan is very much aware of.

“Last winter was quite bleak for us,” he says. “We went through a barren spell there from kind of January to March. I dunno if the horses weren’t healthy or whatever it was, but they turned a corner in April, and I’ve not looked back since.

“We’ve had a consistent flow of winners, on the flat and over jumps from April to now, and I think that has really helped. The phone does ring when you’re having winners, but it can be quite lonesome when you’re having a bad spell.”

Dog-eat-dog

On the subject of racing’s ups and downs, Hogan says: “I’m lucky that I’ve got good support, I’ve a good team, but it’s tough. For the jockeys, I see it here, I have a lot of apprentices, and since I started training, we’ve had a lot of jockeys through the yard - some very successful, and some not successful - and it’s tough for them, even for good riders.

“When I’m sitting in the weighroom, I see so many lads that are talented, and it’s such a shame that there’s only room for so many. There’s some really good riders who are basically journey jockeys because they don’t have a job and there’s only jobs for X amount. Unfortunately, that’s just the way the game is. It’s very competitive. Some guys are not able to handle it mentally, and some can, you know.”

Hogan returned to the weighroom himself in November, after a two-year absence. On his return to race-riding, he says: “To be honest, I really enjoy it and I’ve missed it a lot.

“I was still riding work and schooling a lot, and there’s been times ever since I stopped where I say I’m going to go back, but I was just so busy.

“I wanted to go back in the summer but I was busy with sales, and I wasn’t fit, because I was away a lot. I couldn’t give it any attention, but I got my act together then and start doing a bit of running.

“I’m not going to be full-time; if a horse needs claiming off, that’s fine. If an owner needs any rider, I’m not standing in the way of anyone, but I’m happy if an owner wants me to ride. But it’s not my number one business any more.”

This leads me to a question that may be impossible to answer - which does he prefer, training or riding? “It’s a hard one to answer,” he says. “I suppose you have to look at it long-term; you can’t ride horses forever.

“In every yard I got to ride out in, I was always more intrigued about the training methods and regime than I was about race riding. Riding and training a winner, there’s so much work goes into it on both sides that when it comes off, it’s a great feeling.”