DAVID MARNANE © Photo Healy Racing
I was born in Bansha, Tipperary and my parents had a farm here, and originally had a pub and a B&B. My brother Con and I got into ponies when we were very young. My dad always loved the racing and, when he got a chance, he went to the sales and bought a couple of quite cheap horses. We had a local trainer Danny O'Connell and he trained them. I kind of went from riding ponies to seeing the horses running and I really liked the racing. Then Con came back from Australia and America and he started training a few of the horses after Danny, and I started riding out there for him when I was very young especially in the mornings before I went to school and the weekends.
Then I got a summer job with Tommy Stack who was just up the road. I liked it that much that I stayed. I only did 5th year at school and I told my mother one day that I was wasting her money and my time! She had to agree with me in the end. I spent about a year and a half with Tommy. I was riding in a few amateur races just for my dad really and we had a very good filly called Elag. She was a wonderful mare and, without much assistance from the saddle, she won my first six races in bumpers and over hurdles (in 1989 and 1990). I got bitten by it then and I loved it.
John Banahan, who ended up being a good friend of mine, was the amateur for Mick O'Toole and I got word that he was turning professional for Mick. I reached out and ended up getting a job with Mick who was one of life's greatest characters and gentlemen. He was excellent to me from the time I got there until the end, I loved every minute of it. I just kicked on from there and Micko was great not only at helping me out with rides, but he also got onto nice trainers for me so I ended up riding for Dermot Weld in the big amateur flat races and won quite a few of them.
I formed an association with Liam Browne, he wouldn't have had many but he was an absolutely phenomenal trainer. When he had one ready, he really had it ready. He told me that he was going to put me on a very good horse in Dramatic Touch and, sure enough, he won in Leopardstown at Christmas (1992) and won at Leopardstown in January. He was favourite for the Champion Bumper at Cheltenham, but he didn't run and came back in the Champion Bumper in Punchestown (1993) and carried 12-3. I was claiming 3lb at the time and couldn't claim off him, and he still put me up. He was an exceptional horse. I lost my claim in the G.P.T. at Galway (in 1994) on Onomatopeia for Pat Flynn actually beating one of Dermot's (Cliveden Gail). I was runner-up to Willie Mullins in a championship one year and I won all those races you would like to win as an amateur. I remember my time because we had plenty of fun. Certainly nowadays the amateurs are much more professional about it.
I was riding away and I wasn't really being fulfilled by it. I always wanted to travel and I think I just got a little bored in Ireland. If our game does one thing, it gives people a huge opportunity to travel. The options are limitless. I was very lucky that my wife and I got approached to go to Dubai. I was going over as a work rider for Kiaran McLaughlin and Mel was to run one of the barns. We went out with the idea that we would spend a year, maybe two years there. Dubai was in its infancy at the time - racing was going but it wasn't anything like it is now. Kiaran was an absolute gentleman and I loved every minute of it - the place and the people. A lot of the horses were big, burly, strong, different types of horses. They even had a different shape about them, they were still very fit and they did things right. It was very interesting to see that and I learned a lot from that. I think we ended up nine years out there. Kiaran went back to America and was over and back doing six months training in both places, and eventually he decided he was going to stay in America so Doug Watson, his assistant trainer, took over. We stayed with Doug for another year. Myself and Doug go back a long way and are great friends. Doug filled Kiaran's role seamlessly. He was a super trainer and was always going to be successful in Dubai.
I have four children - Cameron and Rianna, the twins, and Amber followed suit soon after, and Emily is the youngest - and they were sort of getting to primary school age, so we had to make a decision whether we would stay or come home. Con was thriving in the breeze-up industry and we had a place at home and the opportunity to start on a very small scale. I'm not sure that training was something that I had envisaged myself doing. We came back and started very small, the first year I think I had six or seven horses. One of Con's, Spirit Of Age was our first winner (in Tralee 2005), and that just kickstarted us. For the small string we had, they were pretty successful. Obviously, six becomes 12 and 12 becomes 20 and you're inching up the block. It developed away and then we were quite lucky pretty early to have runners at Royal Ascot. I loved bringing the horses over to compete in the UK and then we had runners out in Meydan (Dubai). It was great to be back with our own horses and Dandy Boy was our first runner and our first winner in 2011. He ran for the vice chairman of Meydan, Malih L Al Basti, a big supporter of racing over the years and that was his first ever winner in Meydan. I do love it, but you have to have the right horses to go out. Dubai has been great to me and is a home from home. Dennis McGettigan and his wife Nicola are very good friends of mine. When Settle For Bay won the Royal Hunt Cup (Royal Ascot 2018), Nicola was recovering from an illness and that was a special day. It had been planned for possibly six months and everything came together which doesn't usually happen!
Lady Tilbury was a four time winner for David© Photo Healy Racing
We would train 30 horses on average. I've just changed direction with the yard over the last couple of years - I set up a syndicate called MRC International. My brother Ed does all the placing of the horses and Amy, my niece, is absolutely fantastic at sourcing yearlings for a fraction of the price at the sales. All the ingredients were there, so we launched MRC International. It is for a pool of horses - around 20 yearlings are bought every year - with a view to trying to find good horses. The first year was successful and the second year was probably more successful, and we are just about to roll out the third one now. We have 17 bought so far and we are probably going to buy a few breeze-up horses. It has been a life changer here. We have gone from sort of older handicappers now to having two and three-year-olds in the yard. The members of the syndicate are from all over the world - Australia, America, Ireland, England and even Dubai as well.
We just sold Lady Tilbury on Tuesday. We run the syndicate for two years, so at the end of their three-year-old career the horses go. She was bought for £18,000 and she ran in the Queen Mary for us, she was stakes placed and won four races. Paddy Twomey bought her for £150,000. It is good business and I wish him the very best of luck with her. I find the biggest thing with syndicates is that there doesn't seen to be a beginning or an end. The beauty of our syndicate is that it is a one-off fee and there is a beginning and an end. We are trying to be commercial. Night Moon, a winner of a handicap down in Listowel, was sold to Willie Mullins in the October Horses in Training sale for £100,000. That's what we want to do - buy them as yearlings and not spend too much on them, and really enjoy a couple of years and then we finish it and start again. We are definitely open for business and there's still a few shares left in MRC 3.
We are having lots of winners and lots of placed horses. The prize money is so good for these two and three-year-olds. I could be looking at one of our older horses, Freescape, who could be rated over 100 and is running for around €18,000 and taking on very good horses. Then you see two-year-old maidens running for €25,000. Don't get me wrong, they are all competitive races, but there are good incentives to have two and three-year-olds running in Ireland. The racing industry in Ireland is competitive, but it is very rewarding. I don't mind the competitive side of it. Our racing here in Ireland is so strong, there isn't a bad race anywhere. For that reason, you have a lot of interest in our horses from America, Australia, Hong Kong, Dubai and the Middle East. If you find a good horse, you are rewarded for it. I love racing in Ireland, but I also love having a good horse and travelling with it.
We as a family are steeped in this game. It was a tragic loss to have Theresa (Marnane, sister-in-law) taken away at such a young age this week, but we are all there for each other. My mother Mary is a real rock around us all. People have come from far and wide in the racing community to pay their respects and that is one of the biggest things the racing community does.
David was in conversation with Michael Graham
