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    Adrian Heskin, a Grade 1-winning rider, steps down from the saddle at age thirty-two
Adrian Heskin, a Grade 1-winning rider, steps down from the saddle at age thirty-two
Adrian Heskin. Source: racingpost.com

Adrian Heskin, a Grade 1-winning rider, steps down from the saddle at age thirty-two

Adrian Heskin, a two-time Cheltenham Festival winner and multiple Grade 1-winning jockey, has announced his retirement from racing at the age of thirty-two.

The Kilworth, County Cork native, was retained by Max McNeill in Britain for seven seasons before they parted ways last year. He returned home earlier this season.

Under rules, Heskin rode 436 winners, with a career-high 54 victories in Britain in his first campaign with McNeill from 2016 to 2017. They won the Sefton Novices' Hurdle at Aintree that season with the Tom George-trained The Worlds End, and they repeated as major winners two years later when they won the Long Walk Hurdle at Ascot with the same horse. 

Together with Threeunderthrufive and Tritonic, they also experienced noteworthy victories.

Heskin's decision to return home was, nevertheless, prompted by the end of their association. Since then, he has had difficulty establishing himself and has only won four times, the last coming while riding Hauturiere, trained by Willie Mullins, in a Grade 2 novices' chase at Limerick over the Christmas season.

"After 15 years of race riding I've decided to call an end to my career," Heskin posted in a statement on X on Monday evening. "I'm very proud of my career and achieved far more than I could have imagined as a kid. I rode for the best of trainers on both sides of the Irish Sea and some fantastic owners along the way. Of course, some amazing horses too. My love for horses is stronger than ever and I owe everything I have to them. Here's to the future."

A decade and a half ago, Heskin made history as Michael Hourigan's latest prodigy at the age of seventeen and claiming seven pounds, he led A New Story to victory in the 2010 cross-country race, making history as the youngest rider to win the Cheltenham Festival.

He quickly added the bet365 Gold Cup at Sandown on Hourigan's Church Island a month later, and Barry Connell, who was then his employer, saw him win his breakthrough Grade 1 on the Mags Mullins-trained Martello Tower.

His most recent victory came in a maiden hurdle at Tramore last month on John Queally's Gaillimh A Run.

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