Michael O'Sullivan, hailed as National Hunt's 'next superstar', suffered a devastating injury, casting a shadow over the racing community. His meteoric rise, backed by the astute trainer Barry Connell, showcased O'Sullivan's exceptional talent and promising future.
It was early 2022 when Michael O’Sullivan was dubbed National Hunt ’s ‘next superstar’. Racing isn’t short of hyperbole but there was something genuine in what the proposer was suggesting. Barry Connell is an interesting man in his own right, a self-made millionaire who opted to swap the financial world for the trainer’s yard. Success quickly followed. Yet even so, every dancer needs a partner. And that’s where O’Sullivan came in.
He was 22, an Under 21 champion Point to Pointer, and a graduate from UCD. Now he was on a Masters in horsemanship, Listowel, Roscommon, Navan his finishing school. Winners came quickly, Connell’s investment and faith quickly vindicated. “Michael is the next superstar,” said Connell in 2022 after an early win in his pro career. “He’s in three days a week and will be riding all of mine. He didn’t look like a 7lb claimer out there.” What O’Sullivan did look like was a star. He had nerve, skill, tactical awareness and a great judge of pace. This is what he said about his career in 2023: 'It would be fair to say I'm analytical about things. 'It's important to study the races you're riding in. At the end of the day planning is important and to have that mindset, to know how horses like to race, not just your own, and how they're likely to be ridden.' His family, from Cork, were big in the point-to-point world. Dad William, uncle Eugene and cousin Maxine were successful in their own right in racing. Uncle Eugene trained 66-1 Come To Pass at Cheltenham in 2020 with the 66-1. Michael’s cousin, Maxine, was the jockey. He could easily have stayed in that comfort zone, found a job on the back of his degree in agriculture from UCD, mixing his passion for racing with the comparative ease of the nine-to-five office life. Instead he chose the riskier option. After riding 34 winners in points, he rode his first winner as a claiming professional on Dangan Des Champs in Sligo. Connell noticed and gave him his shot, something O’Sullivan was grateful for. 'He (Connell) understands a race might not always work out the way you want it to, or works out differently to what you thought beforehand. 'He's very fair to ride for, very straightforward. He gives his opinion on what he thinks we should do and then I say my part, and we're on the same wavelength,' O’Sullivan said in 2024. Being a jockey was his No1 ambition, the agriculture degree his back-up plan. He once said: 'Racing is a short career and volatile ...' Yesterday we discovered the danger of the sport so horribly. Everyone in the sport is backing him. “It is very sombre. All the riders are upset, spanning right across to Michael’s colleagues that ride on the flat,” Irish Jockeys Association secretary, Andrew Coonan, said. “Everyone is pulling together as best they can. But you can imagine there’s a lot of shock, a lot of upset.”
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