Successful dual purpose trainer John Quinn’s journey from the bottom to a thousand winners

JOHN Quinn started with nothing. Now, as he celebrates 1,000th success after Safe Voyage’s victory at Epsom on Derby day, he looks back with pride on his early years.

“We had nothing to lose because we didn’t have anything to lose,” he told The Yorkshire Post in a candid interview this week.

“We started with two horses. I was the staff, trainer, head man, assistant trainer, rode out, you name it. It was great. If you jump in the deep end and you’re not a great swimmer, you have to learn to swim.”

Yet, while the early years were spent swimming against the tide, the reverse is true today. Now their Malton dual purpose operation is one of the most respected in the country with owners, and horses, to match.

One of a handful of trainers to have landed elite Group One races under both codes, and also record Royal Ascot and Cheltenham victories, Safe Voyage’s landmark win at Epsom under Jason Hart was the culmination of a lifetime’s work.

That Quinn watched the race at home, rather than being at the track, did not diminish from the sense of achievement. “It’s very satisfying and a great tribute to all the people who have had horses in training with us over the years, and the wonderful staff who’ve worked, and work, with us,” he said.

“We would loved to have gone to Epsom but, because of the virus that we are all having to work with, we didn’t go. To do it on Derby day, which is one of the biggest, if not the biggest day of the year, it’s brilliant.”

In fairness, Quinn would have been just as happy to record the milestone at one of “the lovely tracks in Yorkshire” or anywhere else for that matter.

He was aware the record was in sight after asking his son Sean, his assistant trainer and yard statistician, a couple of years ago. Then Quinn was 100 winners shy of the landmark. When racing resumed, he needed 12 winners. And the next he knew was when he was on the 999-winner mark.

Yet, while Quinn’s name is on the licence, this is a family operation. “My wife Sue has been pivotal to the business and has helped me from day one when we had two horses, her and me,” he disclosed. “Now our children have grown up, our daughter Kelly runs the office and Sean is a huge help to me. Some of our staff have been with us a long time too.”

Originally from Tipperary, Quinn says he was “a journeyman jockey with a small j” before joining the late trainer Jimmy Fitzgerald’s operation in Yorkshire and then setting out on his own in 1994 when he saddled two winners.

Progress was slow – just one success in 1995 – before Tara’s Girl in the 1999 Hilary Needler Trophy at Beverley pointed to better times and, in time, victory in the 2006 Lincoln with Blythe Knight when the season-opening race was run at Redcar.

Like many of Quinn’s early horses, Blythe Knight also excelled over hurdles and the trainer names Countrywide Flame, winner of the 2012 Triumph Hurdle at Cheltenham, as his best National Hunt horse.

On the Flat, it is The Wow Signal who won at Royal Ascot in 2014 before landing the Group One Prix Morny in France.

And while Quinn’s background is steeped in National Hunt racing, the sport’s fluctuating finances mean the majority of his 70 horses in training compete on the Flat.

“Some of the best horses we had early on were the National Hunt horses and were terribly lucky to have a couple of winners at Cheltenham (Character Building won the 2009 Fulke Walwyn Kim Muir Challenge Cup),” he explained.

“Latterly our better horses have been Flat but that‘s not to say my interest has diminished in any way, but it can be easier training Flat horses and I stress ‘can’ with a small c.”

Quinn says the combined success of a clutch of pre-eminent Flat trainers based in Yorkshire has helped convince owners from all over the world that their horses can excel here. “Now they can see we’re home to some of the finest trainers in the country. It’s much more of a level playing field.”

In the meantime, Quinn is looking for the next horse to take his yard to new heights. “Horses are like people, They get a little older. As you get older, you get wiser but not quicker,” he says.

He does so, however, with his enthusiasm undiminished. “Some people need to work to eke a living out,” he ventures. “What I do, it’s a passion. There will be days when it is raining, your horses are not running great and your gallops are frozen. But you’ve just got to get on with it, work hard and stay positive.”

And John Quinn does that in abundance.

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