Fergal Lynch allowed to ride in Britain for initial one-year period

Fergal Lynch is allowed to ride in Britain for an initial one-year period, confirmed the British Horseracing Authority.

Lynch, 36, admitted to stopping a horse, Bond City, from winning at Ripon in August 2004, supplying inside information about six of his rides, and associating with the disqualified Miles Rodgers.

The former champion apprentice was fined £50,000 in July 2009 and agreed not to ride in Britain for at least a year as part of a plea bargain agreement with the BHA. He has been granted permission to ride in Britain under BHA rules as an overseas jockey, initially for a probationary period.

The decision to lift the restriction was made by the BHA and followed the receipt of an application from

Lynch, together with extensive written submissions, and subsequent interviews with the jockey and his representatives. The lifting of this restriction will be subject to on-going review.

His bid to regain a jockey’s licence in Britain had been refused by a licensing committee of the BHA in March 2011.

The committee rejected his application as it felt he was not a suitable, or “fit and proper”, person. He has, however, been free to ride in Ireland, after he was granted a licence by the Irish Turf Club in April 2012.

Lynch, who was cleared of race-fixing charges in December 2007 following the infamous collapse of the Old Bailey trial, subsequently started a new career as a jockey in the United States.

He moved to America in 2008, and was a leading rider at Philadelphia Park until July 2009, when the racecourse’s licensing authority decided it would not approve him as a jockey unless he obtained a British licence.

Lynch was then granted a licence to ride in Spain, where he claimed a first European winner in May 2011, after which he began riding in Ireland later that month on his Spanish licence. Between September and November 2011, Lynch also rode in France and Germany.