JIMMY Fortune, with over 1,800 winners to his name, retired after finishing third on Nathra for his former boss John Gosden. He will soon start a property business with his two teenage sons.

Successful 16 times at the highest level, Fortune was retained by the late Robert Sangster and won the Group 1 Racing Post Trophy for him on Commander Collins in 1998. He did particularly well at Ascot, finishing as top jockey with five winners at the royal meeting in 2006 and following up two years later at the autumn fixture on Rainbow View in the Fillies’ Mile and Raven’s Pass in the QEII.

He rode for Gosden for seven years and celebrated his only classic success on the trainer’s Lucarno in the 2007 St Leger.

However, it was trainer Mike O’Neill who originally brought him over from Ireland, putting him up on Joveworth, who won the Ayr Gold Cup at 50/1 in 1989, raising the jockey’s profile.

More recently, Fortune won the Cambridgeshire for Brian Meehan on Spark Plug and the Diomed for Andrew Balding, another committed supporter, on Tullius.

“I’ve had a great career but today felt like the right time to go, in a Group 1 for a trainer who has done such a lot for me,” he said.