Brian O'Connoron the eye-catching success in Britain of a new wave of Irish jockeys.
It's four years since Daryl Jacob decided enough was enough and invested in a ticket for England. It's hardly an unknown scenario for Irish teenagers, but by any standards the Enniscorthy-born rider was set upon a well-trodden path. After all, when it comes to jump jockeys, the road from the Curragh to the airport is something of a conveyor belt.
Even a cursory look at the jockeys table in Britain confirms the impact of that same belt. High-profile names such as Timmy Murphy and the Grand National winners Graham Lee and Tony Dobbin remain at the height of their profession. Then there are the lucrative raids by Ruby Walsh on big British meetings.
And still sitting on top of the pile is the lean, driven frame of the champion Tony McCoy.
Not even the ever-increasing wealth and success of the game in Ireland has halted the stream of talent that continues to cross the Irish Sea. The Celtic Tiger might still be flashing its tail but there's only so much room on its back.
For many the best option is still to go east. An even slightly closer look at the same table confirms that. McCoy, A & Co can't go on forever and there will be no shortage of younger Irish jockeys waiting to fill the breach.
Jacob, now 23, is just one of them but his progress is better than typical. His is hardly the usual riding background where jockeys are often born into racing families. Jacob's father is a fisherman from Donegal. But for the son, there was no desire to leave terra firma except on the back of a horse.
Ponies and hunting preceded a 10-month course at the apprentice school in Kildare and then three years spent on the Curragh with Dessie Hughes. The trainer did his best. There were 25 rides for Jacob over a year-and-a-half - but no winners. It was time to think again.
"It was very hard for him. There were loads of guys around like Roger Loughran and Kieren Kelly and there are only so many chances you can have in Ireland," Jacob recalls.
It was the much-missed Kelly, tragically killed in a fall in 2003, who advised the eager youngster to ride out in England for the summer. Hughes's son Richard was stable jockey to the top flat trainer Richard Hannon so the first stop was a no-brainer. But after that, Jacob followed his nose and the tide of events with a skill his dad would appreciate.
"I was told there might be something with Robert Alner in Dorset and he and Sally Alner have been very good to me. I started riding in point-to-points around the West Country and that's how I got noticed. Then I became stable amateur for a couple of years before turning conditional," he recounts.
Currently Jacob is in second place in the conditional championship, jump racing's equivalent of the apprentice table, and is approaching 30 winners for the season.
Way ahead of him in that race is another young Irishman, Tom O'Brien, who has broken through in such spectacular style he led the jockeys standing for much of the summer until McCoy returned from injury. He still remains a clear third behind McCoy and Richard Johnson.
O'Brien, 19 and a nephew of the champion trainer Aidan O'Brien, was an unknown amateur just a couple of years ago but since joining another West Country trainer, Philip Hobbs, he has enjoyed a meteoric rise and is one of the most high-profile of the new generation of Irish jockeys in Britain. But he remains one of many.
Paddy Brennan has emerged from a much longer grind through the ranks than O'Brien to hold down the job as retained rider to the super-wealthy owner Graham Wylie. Back in Ireland, the Gort, Co Galway, native had some 300 rides on the flat for Jim Bolger before leaving for Britain.
"There are more opportunities in England simply because there is so much more racing," he says. "Some trainers over here will give a young guy a chance in sellers' or conditional races as long as they can claim off a horse.
"But it's not easy. I know lots of good jockeys who have come over here and gone home again three months later. I know that when I left Bolger's it was backwards I went for two years. No one knows you and you really have to put in the hard graft.
"Only then did I start to ride a few winners and get going," Brennan adds.
Jacob also emphasises that leaving for Britain is not taking an easy option. But there is also no doubt that if a young jockey is prepared to put in the work, then sheer weight of numbers at work will allow a better chance of getting some attention.
"Opportunities are so scarce at home. You might have only two or three meetings a week and you've got the likes of Ruby Walsh, Paul Carberry and Barry Geraghty getting all the best rides. Over here, there are three or four meetings a day through the winter and it's seven days a week. I'm not saying you get anything on a plate but I still would advise young lads, if things are scarce at home, to come over," Jacob says.
The advantages of such a move never got a better advertisement than when Jacob displayed his skill on a national stage at Aintree last month by winning the Grand Sefton Chase over the huge Aintree Grand National fences in front of the BBC cameras on board I Hear Thunder. In terms of profile, such big victories can be worth any number of minor wins around some of the gaff tracks, and the Wexfordman is determined to make the most of it.
It's an example that will continue to keep Aer Lingus and Ryanair in business. Last month, Tom Molloy, who rode 15 winners in Ireland, became the latest to try and follow in the footsteps of McCoy and Brennan by leaving Jim Bolger's yard and trying his luck in Britain. Within a week, he had secured his first winner.
"He has joined Philip Hobbs and wants to make a go of it over jumps," says Brennan. "But he's going to have to work very hard."
What Molloy won't lack for, however, is encouragement. All he has to do every time he's at the races is look around the jockeys' room and see the proof of what can happen.
Irish jockeys in Britain The rising Irish stars in Britain
Paddy Brennan: Established as first jockey to the leading owner Graham Wylie, the 26-year-old from Gort in Co Galway made his reputation with Philip Hobbs.
He describes Tony McCoy as "one in a million" and the main reason for him becoming a rider.
Tom O'Brien: A nephew of the champion trainer Aidan O'Brien, this 19-year-old was riding flat champions such as High Chaparral and Rock Of Gibraltar in their home work just four years ago.
Currently third in the jockeys table and already guaranteed the conditional title.
Daryl Jacob: Enjoyed his biggest success on board I Hear Thunder over the big Grand National fences at Aintree last month. Principally employed by Robert Alner and a product of the RACE academy in Kildare.
Peter Buchanan: The former top amateur in Northern Ireland has graduated from Trinity College with a Finance and Accountancy degree.
Another former winner over the big Aintree fences on board Forest Gunner and rides for the Scottish trainer Lucinda Russell.
Paul Moloney: Tipperary native who rode a young Moscow Flyer to win the Morgiana. Injury-plagued since moving to Britain but the 27-year-old has teamed up with the rising Welsh trainer Evan Williams and enjoyed his biggest success on State Of Play in the Hennessy.
