“It’s always been the plan for me to be the trainer and Harry to be the jockey,” Dan Skelton says as he and his brother prepare for the Cheltenham Festival this week. Harry Skelton is the bookmakers’ favourite to become the champion jockey of jump racing this year while Dan is the most promising young trainer in England and challenging the powerhouse yards of Paul Nicholls and Nicky Henderson.
Their ambitions stem from their father, Nick, who won gold medals in showjumping at the London and Rio Olympic Games. Nick Skelton was 58 when he won individual gold in 2016 and that sporting drive has been handed down to his sons, who are also two of the most engaging men in racing.
This story seems even more refreshing after a bleak period since last year’s Festival was held in front of massed crowds just as the pandemic began to spread with alarming speed. That mistaken decision to press ahead at Cheltenham has clouded a sport that now looks even more battered following the publication last month of the infamous photograph of the Irish trainer Gordon Elliott sitting on top of a dead horse. The brothers will soon express their anger and regret at the damage done to racing but first they trawl through their memories.
“There’s actually a little video of Harry at 18 months old with his skullcap on, pacing around on his pony, and I’m there as the trainer,” Dan remembers. “So from a very young age we knew what we wanted. Obviously, with Dad, we always had that competitive side to us. And then later he was a silent force behind us. You never see our dad at the front of things. He’s not actually that personable and he likes to be in the background.”
Dan and Harry are very different to their father for they are both extremely approachable. They are also close after enduring adversity together when they were much younger. “I’d say it was 16 years ago when we lost our mum,” Harry says. “Obviously to lose a parent at that age was very hard. But our parents split up when we were very young, so I never remembered them together. But me and Dan have always been very close. It’s always been the two of us together.”
Dan, at 35, is four and a half years older than Harry. He spent nine years working at Nicholls’ yard, mainly as an assistant to the champion trainer at a time when horses such as Kauto Star and Denman were imperious and he says: “I’ve always been ambitious and I think that’s by virtue of being around my father and then Paul. They’re high-achieving, ambitious, forward-thinking people and it rubbed off on me. It was an amazing time at Paul’s.”
Quick Guide
Greg Wood’s tips for Sunday
Lingfield Park
1.53 Merry Secret
2.23 Pure Perfection
2.55 Glasvegas
3.28 Fard
3.58 Copinet
4.33 Albert Camus
5.08 Iconic Belle
Warwick
1.37 Finistere
2.07 Calico
2.37 Pink Legend
3.12 Embole (nb)
3.42 A Time To Shine (nap)
4.15 Looks Like Power
4.50 Bizerta
5.22 Mucho Mas
Harry also spent a lot of time at the Nicholls yard. “We were surrounded by the best people,” he says, “and I was always listening to Ruby Walsh [the great Irish jockey who rode most of Nicholls’ best horses]. I learned an awful lot from him.”
Nicholls and Walsh were ideal mentors and, in 2013, the brothers decided to take the bold step of setting up their own operation, Dan Skelton Racing in Warwickshire. Harry is married to his fellow jockey Bridget Andrews, who also rides for her brother-in-law, while Dan’s wife, Grace, has the business acumen to negotiate the tricky and expensive terrain of jump racing.
“Financially it was daunting but we had support from my father and my in-laws,” Dan explains. “But any fear or lingering doubt I might have had was helped by the fact that Harry is such an experienced jockey and Grace takes care of the business side. I really take it for granted that will be OK and I get on with training horses.”
Does it help that Grace is, in Dan’s words, “not horsey”, as racing can be so consuming? “Definitely. I’m very aware of what I can and can’t do. Grace is exactly the same. She is highly intelligent and she knows that racehorses are not her speciality. But she understands the stresses and strains and she is great around the owners. Harry is very personable and I like to think I am too. Bridget is slightly quieter, more reserved, but great company, and it all adds up.”
For Harry it helps that he and his wife are both jockeys. “Massively,” he says. “We stick together and she understands the good and the bad days.”
”At the start,” Dan explains, “the most daunting thing was after the first half-dozen races I realised that this is a lot harder than I thought it was going to be. We went nearly 15 runners without a winner. Having gone from Paul Nicholls that springtime with a stack of winners at all the big Saturday meetings, it was a rude awakening.
“But I got my head down and having Harry as jockey, and the support of owners, means you can make decisions because they believe in you. It took two months to get our first winner and until then they all looked fairly moderate. But we had this grey horse called Mister Grez who won down at Ffos Las. There was a lot of excitement but my main emotion was relief.”
Harry, of course, was the jockey on Mister Grez. “He was a real cheeky character as well,” he says. “Everyone loved him and it was brilliant to get that first winner.”
Slowly, Dan’s confidence as a head trainer blossomed. “When I started I was a clone of Paul Nicholls. I said what he said and exercised them the best way that I could mirror what he did. It was only in the third year that we started to get a little bit more individual and do things that suited our environment and suited our horses. That was where the next level came, when we had the courage of our own convictions to make bold, brave and independent decisions.
“The position we’re in now is much more enjoyable. We’ve got more graded Saturday horses and the talent is coming through. We’ve got a good foundation of owners now who really understand what we’re trying to do. We’re in a really good spot.”
Dan lies second to Nicholls in the race to become champion trainer, after 112 winners and prize money that exceeds £1.2m so far this season. Harry is on 106 winners and closing in on Brian Hughes, the leader of the champion jockey table. He has already won three Grade One races this season and has an excellent book of rides on Dan’s horses at the Festival – including Allmankind in the Arkle, Roksana in the Mares’ Hurdle, Nube Negra in the Champion Chase and Shan Blue in the Marsh Novices’ Hurdle.
Harry has already had major success at Cheltenham. “For me to have won the Champion Chase on Politologue last year was very special. He’s trained by Paul but growing up that’s one of the major four Festival races I wanted to win. I’ve been very lucky that I’ve won the two biggest two-mile chases in this country – the Tingle Creek and the Champion Chase.”
He could have ridden Politologue for Nicholls again this week but, as Dan’s stable jockey, he has chosen to be on Nube Negra for Team Skelton. “He’s very impressive and I’m really excited about riding him at Cheltenham,” Harry says. “If it stays dry that will strengthen his chances in the Champion Chase.”
Dan has had winners at the Festival with horses ridden by both Harry and Bridget but the next step for him is to land one of the big four races at Cheltenham. However, after the terrible publicity for racing in recent weeks, he admits that sporting ambitions matter slightly less than normal. What did he think of the Elliott photograph? “It’s awful, just awful,” he says before describing his emotions when, in January, his yard lost two horses, called Mohaayed and Ardlethen. Mohaayed, ridden by Bridget, had won the County Hurdle at the Festival in 2018 and their love of the horse was followed by immense pain when he and Ardlethen both died on the track.
“There’s no guide given to you when you own, train or ride a racehorse,” Dan says. “You are not taught how to deal with a horse fatality. We take pride in our horses and the way they are cared for so when you lose one it’s a terrible, empty feeling. There are so many emotions running through your head and so it’s also a very confusing, conflicting experience. You feel devastated for the horse, you feel robbed – just like you would if you lost a human.
“I remember saying to Harry and Tom Messenger, my assistant: ‘We’re inadequately prepared mentally for these scenarios’ – and so are the owners and the girls and guys who look after these horses. It wouldn’t be human to prepare for a fatality because it’s something that you don’t want to consider. When it happens the mental strain is so hard.”
Harry agrees. “When you lose one it’s the worst part of the job. It’s heartbreaking.”
Sign up to The Recap, our weekly email of editors’ picks
The brothers aim to become, eventually, champion trainer and jockey. They also talk of the tingle they feel as the Festival, even behind closed doors, approaches. But Dan is blunt as his attention returns to Elliott. He contrasts that grotesque photograph with a deeper love for their horses.
“That image extends beyond one man and the implications for him. He’ll be judged on that image and have it on his conscience the rest of his life. For us the horses are part of our team. Harry and Bridget ride them and we all care for them. We respect them, we love them, we understand them. They’re our mates. We’re teammates.”
The Cheltenham Festival will be broadcast on ITV Racing from 16-19 March. Visit greatbritishracing.com