IT is quite remarkable really, that if you landed around Malton some morning, you would be as likely to hear an Irish accent as an English one.

John Quinn arrived there 33 years ago, along with Richard Fahey, David O’Meara and Kevin Ryan, among others. They have joined the Easterbys, Brian Ellison and co in breaking down snobbish notions about the north as a training base.

Without any real fanfare, the Tipperary native has become part of an elite group of trainers who have saddled winners at the primary festivals on the flat and over jumps. Jessica Harrington was the latest to join the club.

When Signora Cabello bagged the Queen Mary, the Camacho filly was just augmenting the stellar record of a man who had already known multiple successes at both Royal Ascot and Cheltenham.

FIRST TASTE OF GLORY

Indeed, long before he was training, he knew glory. Quinn was working for Edward O’Grady when the yard was brimming with top-class talent. He had the thrill of leading in Mister Donovan at Cheltenham, in what is now the Baring Bingham (Ballymore) Novices’ Hurdle, in 1982.

“I got lost in the crowd a few times,” recalls Quinn. “Good old Tommy Ryan was shouting at everyone ‘Let the young lad lead him in!’ I had him once and then I lost him again. Then I got him back again. The crowd was just unbelievable. And the reception he got when we came into the winner’s enclosure was something I’ll never forget.

“That was JP’s first Cheltenham winner and he very kindly has a couple of horses with me and has had them with me for the last couple of years. We’re delighted to have horses for him.”

Project Bluebook and Hargam have done well for the duo but the 57-year-old has long since established his reputation for producing the goods at all levels of both codes. Blythe Knight was like his handler, comfortable at either discipline, a Grade 2 victor over hurdles and Group 3 winner on the flat.

The Wow Signal was France’s champion two-year-old in 2014, after winning the Group 1 Prix Morny. Signora Cabello bids to repeat that achievement tomorrow, having proved her 25/1 Ascot success to be no fluke when bagging another Group 2, the Prix Robert Papin at Maisons-Laffitte.

Countrywide Flame, recommended to him by Ryan, was a Grade 1 victor when storming up the hill to grasp the Triumph Hurdle in 2012. Character Building, Cockney Sparrow, Red Duke, Kashmir Peak, Royal Bonsai and Pevensey are just some of the others that have secured prizes at the higher echelons of the game.

FAMILY BUSINESS

Meanwhile, more than 900 winners have been sent out since 1994, when he had just two horses and the unstinting support of Sue, who had only recently become his wife. Now, reaching 1000 is a definite target. Quinn has achieved this by backing his own judgement to the hilt. In recent years, his 27-year-old son Sean has become his assistant and is a shrewd operator himself.

“He’s been interested, he’s been hanging around me all his life. We do all the sales together, we’ve done them for the last 10 years, even when he was going to school. He does the catalogues for me and also works for William Hill on the television so he follows it intently and is big into the form.”

John and Sue also have three daughters. Kelly is the eldest and like Seán, is full-time in the operation as racing secretary. Michelle helps out from time to time, while Siobhán is a chef.

It is all a long way from Athnid, a small parish outside Thurles. Quinn’s grandfather ran a dairy farm but always had a few horses and the youngster quickly became hooked. As luck would have it, his grandfather happened to be friendly with O’Grady’s mother and so, at 14, Quinn had his first job in a racing yard.

“He was king of the castle at that time. I think the world of Edward O’Grady. He gave me my start and I learned so much. I will never forget where I came from and the grounding I got. You might go out of fashion in racing, and that could happen to any of us, but you never lose your ability and Edward is a brilliant trainer.”

THE BIG MOVE

Quinn became a conditional jockey and in 1985 moved across the water to join Jimmy Fitzgerald.

“There’s a great appeal about English racing and there’s a lot more racing in England for everybody. I felt it was something I wanted to do. I went to England 33 years ago. 1985. I got a job with Jimmy Fitzgerald and worked with him for two years.”

Fitzgerald had made a similar journey to Quinn, having hailed originally from Horse And Jockey, not far from where Quinn grew up. A successful jockey who became an even more successful trainer, he was renowned as a hard taskmaster.

“I said to the boys ‘Who’s your man?’ and he was gone before I got to know him!”

He describes the experience with a hearty laugh: “Jimmy was a brilliant trainer of racehorses. I’d question his man management!”

“I was just thinking the other day, at the time I worked in Jimmy Fitzgerald’s, there was Richard Fahey, myself, Brian Ellison and Ger Lyons. Mark Dwyer and Ronnie O’Leary were there. And Kevin Manning came for a week!

“I said to the boys ‘Who’s your man?’ and he was gone before I got to know him!”

Evidently, Manning decided he would rather put up with a Spartan diet and stick with the flat, no matter what his stature was telling him. As a multiple classic winner and with more than 30 Group 1 winners to his name, it is clear that he made the right call.

SIGNIFICANT GROUNDING

What is also clear is that Fitzgerald provided a significant grounding for many successful horsemen.

“You’d learn. Jimmy was like going to the private school but you’d want to be up doing the lessons!”

After two years, Quinn went freelance. He retired, having ridden close to 200 winners and ran a livery yard in Settringdon. After failing to sell a couple of horses he had been preparing, he decided to take out a licence to get them on the track.

“We started off with two horses and very little else!” says Quinn.

Real Glee was the first runner, going off favourite in a Doncaster bumper in March 1994 but only finishing fifth. Success was far from immediate but Quinn made it happen. Gradually he got good staff and loyal owners. Jumping was the initial primary source of winners but that has changed in recent years.

“I think 2006 was the first year we got the real good ones. The first 10 or 12 years were about keeping going. We had some decent horses, plenty of winners but no real good one. Our first Cheltenham winner was Character Building. Countrywide Flame won the Triumph Hurdle – that was phenomenal.

I’d be as keen to train a Champion Hurdle winner or a Gold Cup winner as I would a classic winner but there are more opportunities to race on the flat.

“Pevensey, when he won at Royal Ascot, we genuinely thought he would win and we definitely needed him to win at that time. Then there was a little quiet time again and The Wow Signal came along. We needed him and he turned up trumps and that seems to be the way it has worked. Signora Cabello has turned up this year, which is fantastic.

“We’re about 90% flat horses now but I’ll always love the jumps and would still love to train more Cheltenham winners. But for a fella who hasn’t got any major backers, we can make more of a living training flat horses because you need big backers to stay gunning over jumps.

“You have to keep the show going. We’re in the business of having horses to run and run plenty and flat racing makes that happen more easily. We do love the jumpers and we’ll always have them. I’d be as keen to train a Champion Hurdle winner or a Gold Cup winner as I would a classic winner but there are more opportunities to race on the flat. And myself and Sean will trawl away at the sales and we’ll buy every type of horse.”

SIGNORA CABELLO

The Ebor meeting is looming in York, Quinn has enjoyed plenty success there over the years. This time, he has high hopes for Mistiroc, Lord Riddiford and El Astronaute. Signora Cabello is entered in the Lowther but that is Plan B in case the ground turns up testing at Deauville tomorrow. She is a testament to the father-and-son teamwork at the sales.

“Myself and Seán do most of the buying and sourcing of our horses. We were at Newmarket and we were nearly bought up when Seán said to me ‘You must come down and look at two fillies, they’ve got good pedigrees.’ So we went down and looked at them.

"We liked Signora Cabello the better of the two, a slightly offset knee but she’s by a sire we like a lot and has a very good back pedigree. Wasn’t over big but we liked what we saw and gave 20,000 for her on spec.”

Zen Racing bought three-quarters of the filly.

“Before she ran, we felt she’d win races but she’s very unassuming at home, she doesn’t burn it up. Ran well, first time in Beverley. She was in the stalls for seven minutes and was last away, only beaten a length and a quarter.”

The trajectory has been upward ever since. Wins at Bath and York soon attracted the investment of Phoenix Thoroughbreds. The two Group 2 wins have followed and now it’s time for a shot at the real big time before targeting the Cheveley Park at Newmarket.

“It’s been four years since we had a champion. That was The Wow Signal and I said to Sean this year, we could do with a good one again and she’s come along. She’s a very good mind and she doesn’t fuss about it... That can only stand to her.”

THE WOW SIGNAL

The Wow Signal was a flat superstar but the negotiations surrounding his subsequent purchase at the Ascot Breeze-Up Sale in 2014 took place on jumping territory.

“We were at Cheltenham that March having a drink before the Triumph Hurdle with Eddie O’Leary. He said to me ‘I’ve got a horse by Starspangledbanner going to Ascot, you must have a look at him.’ Sean went down and he breezed terribly well.

“I rang Eddie and I said to him ‘I like the horse.’ Eddie said ‘He has to make 50 (thousand).’ I said to him ‘I haven’t got 50’ and he said, ‘Well you’ve three hours to find it.’ But then he said ‘I like this horse an awful lot and if you buy him, I’ll keep a leg in him.”

Ross Harmon had been a long-standing owner with Quinn and he bought half of the promising juvenile, with Quinn and O’Leary keeping a leg each.

He won his maiden at Ayr by nine lengths. Al Shaqab took note, bought him a week before Royal Ascot and secured immediate payback when he won the Coventry easily.

The Prix Morny followed and though he did not act around the Longchamp bend in the Lagardere, the colt was pleasing Quinn until breaking down three weeks before the following year’s 2000 Guineas.

“The Wow Signal was phenomenal. Between then and now, we’ve had a lot of winners but we haven’t had a real one so we’re glad the filly came along this year.

“The two of them – we went and found them and put our own money into them. We took a chance because if myself and Sean stayed at home and waited for our yards to fill, we’d only have half the horses we have.

“We’ve a very good working relationship with all the sales companies. They’re very good to us and we’d always pay. But we’d never have got out of the 20s in numbers if we didn’t go buy them... The mountain didn’t come to Muhammad.”

COMING HOME

Quinn enjoys coming back home to race though he hasn’t had many runners over the years. Project Bluebook won a Grade 2 juvenile hurdle at Fairyhouse last year and though the rain has not helped his Galway Hurdle bids the last two years, it came at the right time for stablemate Safe Voyage to land a big pot at Ballybrit 13 days ago.

“We were delighted when Project Bluebook won and we felt a race like this was well within Safe Voyage’s compass but he needed a cut in the ground so since he’d won in Haydock, he’d been in dry dock. But his owner has been with me a long time, Ross Harmon. He knows the craic so we were absolutely thrilled.”

A return for Irish Champions Weekend is on the cards.

“We’ve had runners in Galway the last couple of years and it’s been fantastic. We’d a horse that ran well in a big handicap on Champions Weekend last year and we’re thinking of sending Safe Voyage there for the seven-furlong race in a month.

“The festivals in Ireland are very lucrative. The money’s great and people love going racing in Ireland, it’s great craic. Ross had never been racing in Ireland and he said, even aside from the horse winning, the hospitality shown to him and his wife was phenomenal, and that’s very important.”

Meanwhile, he and Seán will be regulars at all the sales in Ireland in the coming weeks and months.

“Every winner is terribly important but if you can deliver on the big day, it can only help the cause. And that’s not just for me, it’s for all the lads. And it gives us great satisfaction, for the filly to win the Queen Mary this year and I don’t know if we had the price when myself and Sean bought her… And that is the truth!

“I don’t gamble on horses, but I gamble in them. We buy plenty of horses. We won’t be paying three and four hundred thousand for a horse on spec but wherever we turn up, we can buy horses and we pay for them. The one thing you need are horses so we’ll never be slow in buying them.”

He considers himself lucky to love his job but believes there are a couple of areas that needed to be addressed by racing.

“The one thing that we must ensure is that young people are enticed into the industry all over Europe. In my day, it was difficult to get a job in racing in England because the lads were coming over in droves but now, the young people aren’t coming into racing for one reason or another like my generation did.

“So that’s something that has got to be addressed because it is a good job now, the money is good and the opportunities are good. We realise that very few make it up the ladder as jockeys but there’s a great career for horse people all around the world. So we gotta make sure that the young people are enticed into it.

“Then, in England, they must make sure that the prize money is brought up. You look at the race card some day and see three grand and you’re thinking ‘Bloody hell.’ It’s not attractive to owners. You look in Ireland and the bottom pot is €10,000. So it’s something that needs to be kept as healthy as possible.

“But you couldn’t knock the game for me. So many people are getting a living out of it and so many people enjoy it.

“I have just turned 57 but consider myself an apprentice trainer when you see the likes of Kevin Prendergast and Mick Easterby, still going strong well into their 80s.

“Hey look, it’s what we like. It’s horses and I’d do it all again and do it willingly. There were plenty of times money was awful scarce, if it was there at all.

“We’re looking for the next winner, whether it be today at Leicester or tomorrow at Ayr. And then looking for the next good one, whether it be a Cheltenham horse or a Royal Ascot horse. And that’s our brief.”