With Wales excluded from most sports – see Sport in Cardiff for more – and with Welsh rugby union, the sport that defined our nation for over a century, being in such a lamentable condition, it has largely been left to football to give Welsh sports fans anything to cheer about in recent years – the World Cup play-off semi-final against Bosnia & Herzegovina in March being the next daunting challenge for Welsh international soccer.

However, there is one very popular but often overlooked sport where Wales currently reigns supreme: National Hunt horse racing. A tribe of talented young jockeys, enabled by the successful stables of a coterie of canny trainers and inspiring each other to get better and better, now dominate racing over jumps in the UK to an extent that has never happened before.

Particularly in rural Carmarthenshire, Glamorgan, Flintshire, Gwent and Pembrokeshire, Wales has long had a close affinity with horseracing and produced many outstanding jump jockeys – such as Tom Davies (1819-1913), Joe Jones (1843-1924), Henry Davies (1865-1934), Ivor Anthony (1883-1959), Owen Anthony (1886-1941), Jack Anthony (1890-1954), Dick Rees (1894-1951), Lewis Rees (1898-1972), Dudley Williams (1902-1981), Fulke Walwyn (1910-1991), Evan Williams (1912-2001), Mervyn Jones (1919-1942), Dick Francis (1920-2010), John Cook (1937-1999), Bob Davies (1946-), Hywel Davies (1957-), Neale Doughty (1957-), Carl Llewellyn (1965-) and Sam Thomas (1984-), to name just some of the better-known.

But nothing in the past can compare to the platoon of Welsh jockeys now taking National Hunt racing by storm. First and foremost is SEAN BOWEN. In 2024/25 he rode 180 winners and became the first Welshman since Bob Davies in 1971/72 to become National Hunt racing’s champion jockey, and only the 6th – following Ivor Anthony (once), Jack Anthony (twice), Dick Rees (five times), Dick Francis (once) and Davies (twice) – to be crowned jump jockey champion since the title was officially inaugurated in 1900. In the current 2025/26 season (seasons run from the start of July to the end of April), Bowen has already reached 161 winners before the end of December – 90 ahead of his nearest rival – and is a cast iron certainty to take the title for a second consecutive season. His combination of strength, courage, dedication, tenacity, intelligence and sheer horsemanship is proving unsurpassable. And, with the 27-year-old entering his prime as a jockey, it is by no means beyond the bounds of possibility for him to maintain ascendancy for years ahead and break Dick Rees’s Welsh record of five National Hunt championships.

Sean Bowen was born into a racing family in the village of Casnewydd Bach (Little Newcastle)*¹ in northern Pembrokeshire. His father Peter Bowen took out a training licence in 1995 having built a good reputation in point-to-points (racing over farmland for hunting horses and amateur riders). He and his wife Karen, a renowned point-to-point rider, moved to nearby Treletert (Letterston), bought a few fields, gradually converted them into a top-class training facility for thoroughbreds and in the years that followed horses from Peter Bowen’s stables won big races around the UK. He retired earlier this year when his oldest son Mickey was ready to take over the yard while his two other sons, Sean and James (see below), concentrated on riding. Amazingly, Sean was allergic to horses as a youngster and even now can suffer reactions if in sustained contact with horse hair. Learning to ride in pony races and point-to-points, his potential was clear at age 17 when he was the youngest ever champion conditional (apprentice) jockey. Every season since, his number of winning rides has risen inexorably and in a mere 10 years he has incredibly shot past the 1,000 winners landmark. He is a true Welsh wonder. While racegoers roar him past the finishing post for yet another victory and owners and trainers everywhere compete ferociously for his services, it’s noticeable that BBC Wales keeps ignoring him for its ‘Sports Personality of the Year’ award – probably because Auntie hasn’t got any footage, having lost the rights to televise racing, along with most major sports, long ago.

His 24-year-old brother JAMES BOWEN is fast emerging as an equally brilliant jockey. He was just 16 when he won the Welsh Grand National at Chepstow in 2017, the youngest ever rider to win what has been the highlight of the Welsh racing calendar since 1895. If that were not enough, his mount Raz De Maree became, at age 13, the oldest ever winner of the marathon steeplechase! James followed his brother by becoming conditional jockey champion in 2018, only just failing to take Sean’s record as the youngest ever, and now he’s hot on his heels in the annual battle to be champion jockey (currently lying third in the table). The best of friends are the best of rivals and James will surely prevail one day.

Carmarthenshire jockeys are likewise coming to the fore, hugely helped by the 2009 opening of Ffos Las racecourse at a derelict open-cast coal mine near Trimsaran, five miles north of Llanelli. The brainchild of a real Welsh hero who actually invests in Wales, civil engineer Dai Walters, Ffos Las was the first new racecourse in Wales, and indeed the entire UK, since Chepstow opened in 1926. Along with Chepstow and Bangor-on-Dee, this welcome development brought the number of racecourses in Wales up to three*². Now owned by the Arena Racing group, with Walters remaining as honorary chairman and supporting continual improvements at the course, Ffos Las has been a triumph for Dai Walters. The next innovation is the special St David’s Day meeting that will be launched in 2026. Best of all, the high quality and superb facilities of Ffos Las have encouraged youngsters in the area to take up horse racing.

The lure of Ffos Las helped Carmarthenshire boy JACK TUDOR decide to make the step up from point-to-points rather than pursue his promising career in rugby. In 2018 he was taken on as an apprentice at the marvellous stables developed by owner/trainer ex-jockey Christian Williams at Ogmore Farm and quickly impressed. He was only 17 when he won the Welsh Grand National on the Williams-trained Potters Corner in 2019 and then flourished to extent he was head-hunted in 2023 by David Pipe to replace retiring Tom Scudamore at his illustrious stable in Devon.

Likewise, LORCAN WILLIAMS from Amroth in Pembrokeshire chose racing instead of rugby. He was on the brink of a career playing for the Scarlets, but his love of horses prevailed and he’s gone from strength to strength. His stunning victory this year on Golden Ace in Cheltenham’s Champion Hurdle, National Hunt’s paramount hurdling race, has raised him to the ranks of the racing elite. Carmarthen’s BEN JONES is another who might have become a rugby professional with Scarlets had he not opted for jump racing. He too made the right decision, not only because Welsh rugby has gone down the pan under the leadership of English corporate fat cats but also because he is proving a racing natural, racking up well over 50 winners in each of the last three seasons.

The thriving Welsh pony-racing scene and the rough-and-tumble of point-to-point are great learning-curves for young jockeys on the pathway to professional racing. Such was the trajectory of RICHARD PATRICK, a farmer’s son from Haverfordwest who made his breakthrough when winning the 2023 Welsh Champion Hurdle at Ffos Las on Nemean Lion, and CONNOR BRACE from the Vale of Glamorgan, still only 24 and tipped for the top.

JAMES DAVES from Ceredigion, steeped in racing as the son of legendary jump jockey Hywel Davies, has won over 400 races while still in his 20s. CALLUM PRITCHARD from Llantrisant was comparatively late, at age 25, to shift to the professional sport from hunting and point-to-point but is rapidly making up for lost time. CHARLIE PRICE from Brecon is making a name for himself while, from the Vale of Glamorgan, ELLIS COLLIER is a highly promising conditional jockey at the stables of masterful trainer Evan Williams (no relation of ace jockey Evan Williams referred to in the third paragraph). His pal ADAM WEDGE is already one of the primary riders at the Williams’ operation in Llancarfan. Wedge, who has Grade 1 victories to his name and bagged the Scottish Grand National at Ayr in 2018 on Joe Farrell and the Welsh Grand National in 2020 on Secret Reprieve, is currently out of action with a dislocated shoulder after a bad fall at Ffos Las in November – one of the hazards of the job in the most dangerous sport of all.

Mention should be made of ISABEL WILLIAMS, daughter of Evan, Wales’ leading female jockey who is approaching 100 winners when still only 27 despite not getting anywhere near the amount of rides she merits, and ex-showjumper REBECCA CURTIS, based at stables in Newport Pembrokeshire, one of the top trainers in Wales. Other trainers of note not referred to already in this piece include TIM VAUGHAN at Aberthin near Cowbridge, SAM THOMAS at Dai Walters’ yard in Cardiff suburb Lisvane, and GRACE HARRIS at Shirenewton in Gwent.

With initiatives under way to halt and reverse the decline of point-to-point courses, jump racing is definitely one sport in Wales where optimism is appropriate.
UPDATE: Sean Bowen rode Haiti Couleurs, trained by Rebecca Curtis, to a thrilling victory in the Welsh Grand National at Chepstow on December 27th – a first win in Wales’ principal race for both jockey and trainer.

NOTES
*¹Apropos of nothing at all, Casnewydd Bach was also the birthplace of famed pirate Barti Ddu/Black Bart (1682-1722) – as well as my great-great-uncle!
*²The following, in alphabetical order and using the names applied at the time, are the lost racecourses (both Flat and National Hunt) of Wales:
●Aberdare (1865)
●Abergavenny (1834-1899)
●Aberystwyth (1824-1883)
●Alleston (1894-1914)
●Anglesey (1757-1903)
●Bedwellty (1850-1852)
●Boncath (1843-1902)
●Breconshire (1825-1868)
●Bridgend (1838-1860)
●Caernarfon (1873-1883)
●Cardiff (1782-1939) – see Sporting Death for details
●Cardigan (1838-1840)
●Carmarthen (1801-1914)
●Castlemartin (1848)
●Conwy (1755-1793)
●Cowbridge/Glamorganshire Hunt (1768-1939)
●Freshwater East (1860-1862)
●Grosmont (1836)
●Halkyn (1768)
●Haverfordwest (1742-1901)
●Hay-on-Wye (1840-1841)
●Holywell Hunt (1769-1852)
●Lawrenny (1877-1882)
●Llanboidy (1853-1865)
●Llandovery (1846-1895)
●Llandeilo (1871-1879)
●Llandrindod Wells (1754-1880)
●Llangedwyn (1863)
●Llansilin (1845-1868)
●Llansteffan (1867-1869)
●Llantrisant (1870-1874)
●Llanyblodwel (1866-1868)
●Llanymynach (1799-1864)
●Llwynybrain Hunt (1892-1895)
●Milford Haven (1881)
●Mold (1831-1839)
●Monmouth (1730-1933)
●Montgomery (1824-1864)
●Mydrim (1848)
●Narberth (1850-1856)
●Newmarket (1710-1714)
●Newport (1845-1948)
●Newtown (1826-1865)
●Orielton (1856-1859)
●Pembroke Dock/Pembroke (1863-1894)
●Pembroke Hunt (1887-1901)
●Pontypool (1838-1861)
●Presteigne (1840-1881)
●Rhyl (1843-1868)
●Ruthin (1729-1842)
●Swansea (1790-1888)
●Tenby (1847-1936)
●Tremadog (1807-1811)
●Usk (1895-1906)
●Welshpool (1728-1847)
●Wrexham (1806-1876)
Look out for an article about all 56 of these racecourses in 2026