AS action in the northern region draws to a close at Maralin this afternoon, there will not be a more popular winner of that region’s rider’s title than the affable Mark O’Hare, a mainstay of the northern weigh-tent for two decades.

It has been a remarkable season for O’Hare - a running total of 27 winners for the season equals his second most successful season to date from 10 years ago, and with three weekends of racing remaining, he is just two winners short of matching his most successful season ever, a personal best which has stood for nine years.

The past eight months have seen the 35-year-old really re-capture the winning groove with just three jockeys - Jamie Codd, Barry O’Neill and Derek O’Connor, bettering his total nationally, and the experienced rider is showing no sign of letting up as he will soon head into his 21st season in the saddle.

O’Hare’s path into the saddle was a stark contrast to many of his weigh-tent colleagues. With no family ties to the racing world, it was USPCA inspector Michael Gillen who provided the young Warrenpoint schoolboy with a first introduction to horses, and when Gillen, a former jockey, made a foray into the training ranks, it gave O’Hare his first chance to work with racehorses which would develop into a first ride at Tyrella in 1997 for the late Edward Fitzpatrick.

KEY ROLE

It was while riding out for Fitzpatrick that he became acquainted with the three-time northern champion Liam Lennon, and Lennon would play a key role in the O’Hare story over the subsequent 19 years.

“Liam was probably at the peak of his riding career when I got started and he had also started training a few, so I would pick up some of his spare rides for Edward and on his own horses.

“It was also through Liam that I started riding for Jerry Cosgrave, who I’ve being riding for now for over 15 years. Those local trainers were great supporters of mine from an early point.”

Indeed Lennon would provide O’Hare with a series of firsts in the saddle, beginning with his initial point-to-point winner aboard Cinders Slipper in an older mares’ maiden at the old Comber track in April 1999, while Lennon’s Francoskid would provide him with his first track winners in both Britain and Ireland, obliging at Down Royal in 2002 and at Musselburgh just two months later.

During those early years following that opening point’s success, O’Hare’s time in the saddle was greatly curtailed by a decision to pursue a trade, but it is not a period he looks back on fondly. “When I left school I wanted to pick up a trade so I spent four years on a building site as a plasterer, but I absolutely hated it! I never fell in love with that job.”

Having to divide his time preciously between the building site and pointing fields ensured that winners during that four-year period were few and far between.

However, once making the conscious decision to leave his labouring days behind him and focus fully on race riding, the winners began to flow almost immediately after he switched back full-time to riding, as local handlers were quick to acquire his now more widely available talents.

In his last year dividing the two jobs, a mere five winners from 94 rides during the 2003/04 campaign paled in insignificance against the 24 winners from 173 rides that he had achieved a year later by June 2005, rewarding his commitment at what was the crest of a wave for the popular rider.

It was also during that 2005 season that O’Hare recorded one of the most significant winners of his career when partnering the Ian Duncan-trained 40/1 shot Another Rum to success in the National Hunt Chase at the Cheltenham Festival, ticking off one of the big achievements on any jockey’s career wish list.

“I really fancied him going into the race as he had been running well in graded races and I couldn’t see him finishing outside of the first three. He was a big price and I told some of the locals to back him so they got a great result out of it too! The reaction returning to the winners’ enclosure was brilliant, but it was very hard to take it all in at the time.”

That Cheltenham success was a more than adequate prize for the disappointment of missing out on that season’s regional title to Derek O’Connor, however compensation on that front would await 12 months later, as despite breaking his arm and hip in a fall at Loughbrickland which brought an early end to his season, the 21 winners which he had accumulated to that point would be enough to share the northern title with O’Connor.

SPECIAL MOMENT

For a rider who has become so deeply rooted within the northern pointing scene, it was undoubtedly a special moment for him when joining a very select cohort of riders - John Berry, Adrian Maguire, Jamie Codd and Derek O’Connor, who have all ridden a six-timer between the flags.

He recorded the feat at Taylorstown in April 2007, the first time in 16 years that a rider had won six winners on a single card, and to this day, his remains the only six-timer in the north.

“It was a very important day for me, especially to do it at my local track and for four local handlers Jerry Cosgrove, Colin McBratney, Brian Hamilton and Ian Duncan too.”

As was evident by his initial decision to pursue a trade when leaving school in order to have a career to fall back on, O’Hare is a realist to the pitfalls of life as a point-to-point rider, and the future has always been a cornerstone of his thoughts influencing the different directions that his career has taken, with a season spent at Michael Hourigan’s yard over a decade ago as a consequence of a potential full-time venture into the training ranks.

However, once eliminating that career path, his thoughts again turned to the future. “It was in 2008 that I had ruled out training and I started to think about what I would do for the future. I started on a farrier’s course with Martin McCracken for four years and completed that with CAFRE.”

Despite having ruled out full-time training from his future plans, O’Hare continues to train a couple of young horses each year from Jerry Cosgrave’s yard, and the results are certainly something to be proud of as he has excelled with the select numbers that have passed through his hands over the last decade.

Subsequent track winners Dick Naylor, Whitsundays and Livelovelaugh, all having spent their early days with him, the latter of which won a four-year-old maiden at Oldcastle on debut, and has since won twice under rules for Willie Mullins in the colours of Susannah Ricci.

There followed a number of quiet years in recent seasons as the frailties of trying to balance riding commitments with farrier work took its toll and the winners steadily dried up.

After failing to better six for each of the last three seasons, in addition to the prospect of his wife Sarah, herself a former point-to-point rider who hails from the family of the 1984 Irish National winning jockey Ann Ferris, due to give birth to their now four-month-old daughter Penny, O’Hare frankly admits that he had made the now short-lived decision at the end of last season to retire from race-riding.

“I had said to Sarah, Richard Pugh and some friends that I was going to retire, but then when I really sat down and thought about it, I knew I would be bored at weekends without the point-to-points. The farrier business is going great at the minute, I have a great bunch of clients and that has really allowed me to get back involved riding out and schooling for local trainers during the week which has played a big role this season.”

That success this term for O’Hare has been unrelenting, particularly in the northern region where his intentions became clear from the outset, with the first of five doubles recorded at the opening meeting of the season at Toomebridge for his long-standing ally Liam Lennon.

CAREER MILESTONE

The victories have since flowed freely with winners on 15 of the 18 race days in the north, including a pair of trebles at Tyrella and Kirkistown in March, in addition to a career milestone achieved earlier this month when George Stewart’s Step Back provided him with a 200th career winner at Broughshane.

That success leaves O’Hare with an unassailable 11 winner advantage over nearest rival Barry O’Neill heading into today’s final day of action in the region at Maralin, to provide him with his first outright northern title success.

“It will be great to get it. I am very proud to be from the north, so it means an awful lot to get the regional title. It is nice to win against the likes of Jamie (Codd) and Barry (O’Neill) because those good riders bring you along yourself, and you ride better.”

It is unsurprising that with the winners flowing, thoughts of retirement which almost became a reality at this point last year, have been firmly put on hold. “I would like to keep going for another couple of years because I want to be able to bring Penny racing to see her dad riding winners.”

While a life in the saddle may not have been one many would have predicted for him at an early age, 203 winners alone between the flags over the course of a varied 20-year career tell the tale of the success he has achieved to date.

Having stolen all the headlines in the north this year, there could not be a more worthy and popular winner when he takes to the stage on June 11th to collect his title, and you can be sure the reception he receives from the crowd will illustrate this.