Hat-trick moves Hanagan past 100

It took the 29-year-old – Malton trainer Richard Fahey's stable jockey – most of 2009 to reach three figures for the first time in his burgeoning career.

Yet, when Fahey's Goldenveil carried him to a memorable victory in the first race yesterday, it saw the Yorkshire rider reach his personal century and remain clear of Richard Hughes and Ryan Moore, the reigning champion and Derby-winning jockey, in the title race.

Winner 101 soon followed as Hanagan guided Jim Goldie's Glenluji to an equally emphatic win and the hat-trick was completed as Hanagan secured a narrow success on Silent Lucidity, trained by Peter Niven.

Hanagan said: "Never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined I'd ride 100 winners at this time of the year. I don't really get carried away very often but I was chuffed and delighted with that."

It is a remarkable achievement for a rider who was considered a 33-1 outsider at the start of the season, especially since Northern-based riders do not enjoy the volume of meetings that take place in the South.

Hanagan made his intentions clear with a four-timer on the first day of the season at Doncaster and has not let up as he seeks to become the first Northern champion jockey since Kevin Darley a decade ago.

In doing so, Hanagan appears to be gaining the support and respect of other trainers – he rode for six different handlers at Catterick's recent meeting, including the well-respected Newmarket-based Sir Mark Prescott.

The only apparent difference between Hanagan and his higher-profile rivals is the amount of prize money that they have won.

"I'd be near the bottom of the league in prize money," said Hanagan self-depricatingly.

"I was looking at the list the other day. Ryan Moore was on about 1.7m, and I'm just over half a million. It's a massive difference but thankfully it goes on winners, and I think it should because it's a lot harder work to ride that many winners.

"It used to be my agent ringing people up for rides, but it's the other way around now. I can feel that everyone's pulling for me."

Hanagan also used his century of winners to pay tribute to Fahey, and all those associated with the Malton stable who have put the rider in a position to become only the third Northern rider to be crowned champion after Darley and the 1905 title winner Elijah Wheatley who was based in Lincolnshire.

"People ask if I'd join a big yard down South, but I think I'm in a big yard already and I wouldn't change anything," he said.

"I just wish that we could get the kind of owner to take Richard right up to Group One level. He's won everything else, so a few real Group One horses would be lovely."

In March, after his Doncaster four-timer, he told the Yorkshire Post that 100 winners was his sole objective. While some of his weighing room colleagues have started calling him 'Champ', he knows the title race has only just passed the halfway point and does not conclude until Doncaster in early November.

Hanagan is having to get used to intense media interest – and spending time away from his wife, one of Fahey's secretaries, and two young children, one aged four and the other just seven months.

He is often sustained on the drive to evening fixtures by telephone calls with his eldest child wishing him 'good luck'.

It helps offset the nights when they are sound asleep when he gets home – and the mornings when they are still in bed while he is riding on the gallops.

His philosophy, however, is a simple one. "Whatever you put in you will get out. I've worked hard to get here. Now it's paying off."