Ryan Moore

By the end of the 2017 season, Moore had won over 2,000 races in Britain, the third most of all active jockeys, behind only Frankie Dettori and Joe Fanning, both of whom had been riding for a decade longer.

By 2015, Joseph O'Brien, at nearly 6ft tall, was struggling to make the weight to ride in the major races and his father Aidan needed a replacement. In April, it was confirmed that Moore would ride Ballydoyle's runners in the Classics and other significant races. O'Brien explained the arrangement thus: "Ryan will be riding our main horses this year and Joseph Will be riding other horses when the weights allow him to. Seamie Heffernan and Colm O’Donoghue will also be involved as in the past."

Moore's first mentor was Richard Hannon, a trainer for whom he would still be winning big races when Hannon retired in 2013. He was sent to Hannon by his father. At the end of his first full season, he won the Cesarewitch Handicap and had Group race experience.

Instead, O'Brien's son Joseph became the main rider for Ballydoyle. Moore rode for O'Brien when the trainer had multiple runners. In that way he won the 2012 1,000 Guineas on Homecoming Queen and the 2013 Derby on Ruler Of The World.

He finished fourth in the jockeys' championship of 2012, and runner-up in 2013, behind Richard Hughes. He again finished runner-up in the jockeys' championship of 2014.

He was now riding for several celebrity owners. He rode for many of the Manchester United team including Michael Owen, Paul Scholes, Ashley Cole and manager Alex Ferguson. Moore also rode the Queen's Carlton House to victory in the Dante Stakes at York Racecourse and then to a close 3rd in the Epsom Derby. He finished 2011 by winning a Japanese Grade One on Snow Fairy for the second year running.

O'Brien was rumoured to be lining up Moore as stable jockey from November 2011. Moore had already won in big races for O'Brien while retained by Stoute, including at the Breeders' Cup and Royal Ascot. Stoute's stable had seen a downturn in fortunes, while O'Brien had provided Moore with big winners. O'Brien also had the ante-post favourites for the next season's Classics.

In April 2009, he rode winners at Sandown Park, Sha Tin in Hong Kong, and Windsor on consecutive days, the 36 hour trip to the Far East winning him nearly £50,000 after he won the Queen Elizabeth II Cup on Presvis, trained by Luca Cumani. That summer, he won the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes on Conduit for Stoute. The first three, all trained by Stoute, came together, leading to a steward's inquiry, but Conduit kept the result.

Over the course of 2009 and 2010, he swept the big races of the world. He won at the Breeders' Cup in the autumn after sealing a third jockeys' title. Then he won the 2010 Derby on Workforce in a course record time, and the Oaks on consecutive days. He crowned the year with another win on Workforce in the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe. A broken wrist cost him another chance at the jockeys' title, but he was already being spoken of as an all-time great by some commentators. Former jockey Willie Carson suggested he could be as good as Lester Piggott and predicted he would recapture the jockeys' title in 2011.

In 2007, he rode Notnowcato to victory in the Tattersalls Gold Cup in Ireland, and in the Eclipse. For the latter race, Moore took the horse down the stands side, while the remainder of the field including odds-on favourite and Derby winner Authorized and George Washington.

These efforts were rewarded when he was offered the job as stable jockey at the end of the 2007 season, while he was in Tokyo, riding Papal Bull in the Japan Cup. Hannon meanwhile would make more use of his son-in-law Richard Hughes (jockey), after his retainer with Khaled Abdullah came to an end. Moore would later say of Stoute, "he's just a very clever man - an unbelievable brain."

On the Thursday of Glorious Goodwood in 2007, Moore won four races, including the Goodwood Cup on Allegretto. It is thought he would have won the 2007 jockeys' championship if he hadn't broken his arm in a fall. He would win it again in 2008.

Increasingly, Moore rode for Sir Michael Stoute, sharing those duties with Kerrin McEvoy, Mick Kinane and others after Kieren Fallon quit as stable jockey to ride for Aidan O'Brien. It was for Stoute he had his first Group 1 win, on Notnowcato in the Juddmonte International at York in August 2006. That year he won his first jockeys' title which came as a surprise to him. He had said that the odds of 8/1 on him becoming champion at the start of the season were too generous, but he had expected to finish third. Commentators were suggesting that his "resilience and iron will should turn Moore into one of racing's iconic figures." In 2006, he was riding at 8st 5lb most days.

2004 saw him top 100 winners and £1 million in prize money for the first time and on 29 August, he won his first group race, the Group 3 Prestige Stakes at Goodwood. For Hannon, he then won his first Group 2 race, taking the Mill Reef Stakes on Galleota in September.

His first major victory came for a different trainer, though, when he won the 2002 Cesarewitch Handicap for Martin Pipe on Miss Fara on 19 October 2002. He got his first black type victory later that same year when winning the Listed Jebel Ali Stakes in the United Arab Emirates shortly after Christmas 2002. He didn't score any major victories in 2003, and had a strike rate of under 10%, but it was enough for him to become Champion Apprentice.

Moore rode winners for his grandad before the latter died in 2000. "I was close to him and won a couple of races before he died in 2000. I like to think it made him happy, that it brought him something at the end of his life. I'm glad he saw it." At 16, he weighed 8st 10lb, but by the time he became champion apprentice he had to get down to 7st 13lb.

Ryan Lee Moore (born 18 September 1983) is an English flat racing jockey, who was Champion Jockey in 2006, 2008 and 2009. He is currently the first choice jockey for Aidan O'Brien's Ballydoyle operation, a role in which he mainly rides horses owned by Coolmore Stud. He also sometimes rides horses for Juddmonte and The Queen.