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Big News from Jumps racing

Gigginstown House Stud boss Michael O'Leary has revealed he will not purchase any more young horses with a view to scaling back his racing operations.

In a statement, Gigginstown manager Eddie O'Leary said that they are fully committed to horses currently in the stable.

However, no more purchases will be made and a winding down will take place over four to five years.

Michael O'Leary told the Irish Field: "We wish to sincerely thank all our trainers and their teams for the enormous success we've enjoyed over the past decade but, as my children are growing into teenagers I am spending more and more of my time at their activities and I have less and less time for National Hunt racing, a situation that will continue for the foreseeable future.


"I hope that by running down our string over an extended four or five year period it will give our trainers ample time to replace our horses without disruption."

Eddie O’Leary added: "Michael is a big family man and his children are now growing up and, given his very extensive work commitments, he now wants to spend more time with his wife and family.

"As a result we are not going to be buying any more stores or young horses. We’ve just had the best season we have ever had in Ireland in terms of winners and it’s been an amazing year, capped by Tiger Roll winning the Grand National for the second time last month."

Eddie O'Leary confirmed their trainers will receive their normal number of point-to-pointers this year so and hoped for "many more great days to look forward to into the future".

According to The Racing Post, Gigginstown brought 225 horses to track for six trainers, however Gordon Elliott will be most impacted by this announcement.

Winning almost €4 million in Ireland last season saw Gigginstown top the owners' championship for the fifth year in a row.

RTE

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