Meet your Chair - Dr Jim Walker
One can easily pinpoint two pivotal moments in Jim Walker’s racehorse ownership odyssey. The first was his decision to take a share in a syndicate horse in Hong Kong around 30 years ago; the second was accepting an offer to buy a Teofilo yearling in 2018 after the colt had been rejected by another owner.
The syndicate horse achieved little on the racecourse, yet it provided a tentative first step on the journey towards outright ownership. The Teofilo yearling, subsequently named Subjectivist, became a Group 1 performer in Walker’s lime green silks with royal blue epaulets, achieving his finest hour at Royal Ascot in 2021 with victory in the Gold Cup.
Little wonder, then, that June is a special month for Walker, who was present for that showpiece success having missed other wins owing to the Covid pandemic.
“Royal Ascot 2020 was run behind closed doors, so 2021 was a strange year when crowds were allowed back,” explains Walker, an economist by profession, talking in a London hotel two days before York’s Dante meeting.
“Subjectivist had won the Listed Glasgow Stakes at Hamilton – one of my local tracks – the Group 3 March Stakes at Goodwood, the Group 1 Prix Royal-Oak, the Group 2 Dubai Gold Cup and then the Group 1 Gold Cup. The only one I attended was the Gold Cup – I was stuck in Hong Kong during Covid and couldn’t get back to the UK.
“It was a bizarre lead-up to Royal Ascot, with so many restrictions in place. You needed to apply separately for a parade ring pass, which I didn’t realise.
“When we won the race, my wife and I walked back from the stands to the winner’s enclosure but weren’t allowed in because we didn’t have the right badge. I explained to the security man that my horse had just won the Gold Cup – then we were let in!
Subjectivist gives Jim Walker a memorable victory in the Gold Cup
“I recall collecting the Gold Cup, but from there on I hardly remember anything. Not because of the champagne – by that point the emotion had got to me.”
Walker caught the racing bug early thanks to his parents. Surprisingly for someone brought up in the village of Kilbarchan, around 25 miles west of Glasgow, his early race-going experiences were formed in the West Country.
He says: “I’d grown up either going racing or watching it on the television. My mum and dad were really keen.
“The first racecourse I ever visited was Exeter – then called Devon and Exeter – and the second was Newton Abbot. At the start of the jumps season in August, the first two tracks that staged jumping were Devon and Exeter and Newton Abbot.
“Every year my family used to come to England on holiday and Paignton was the destination, so we went to those tracks.”
Stamina superior
Walker’s love of long-distance races was formed during his time working as an economist in Hong Kong, having relocated there in 1990 for a role with Peregrine Brokerage.
He soon moved on to Credit Lyonnais Securities Asia where his racing-mad boss at the time, Gary Coull, was dead set on claiming the Hong Kong Derby, reasoning that with few other owners importing horses with distance pedigrees, it might be the easiest race to win.
“It turned out not to be the case, but the logic was sound,” Walker says. “All the top executives at that time were either racing fans or owners.
“I’ve always enjoyed mile-plus races. Five- and six-furlong sprints are difficult to win, with too many variables and too many runners.
“It goes against the grain to say you are going for easier races, but non-sprints are often less competitive, usually with fewer hard luck stories.”
William Jarvis, who retired in 2023, had been Walker’s main trainer for many years. Fellow Scot Mark Johnston was another on the roster, the partnership enjoying success with the likes of Monticello and Austrian School, winner of the valuable Queen’s Cup at Musselburgh.
Both Monticello and Austrian School were by Teofilo – “he only ran as a two-year-old but won everything; he could have been another Frankel” – and Walker was keen to buy another by the sire when the opportunity presented itself.
He explains: “A Teofilo colt came up for sale at Tattersalls Book 2 in 2018. I had my eye on him although I was in Hong Kong at the time. I thought that if Mark bought him – he already trained the half-brother, Sir Ron Priestley – I’d get on to him and ask if I can have him.
“I called Mark, but he said he had to offer him to the owner of Sir Ron Priestley first. An hour later, Mark phoned me back to say that [Paul Dean] wasn’t interested and that if I wanted him, he was mine. That was Subjectivist and he cost me 62,000 guineas.
“It was a fluke really, pure luck. All I can say is thank goodness the owner of Sir Ron Priestley didn’t want him!”
Walker joined the Board of the Racehorse Owners Association (ROA) in 2023, taking over as Chair in October after Charlie Parker’s term as President concluded.
For someone who has dined at racing’s top table as an owner, you might be forgiven for thinking that the elite end of the sport would be his priority. Yet it is those operating at the other end of the scale, at grassroots level, who are the focus of his attention.
Walker says: “What nobody seems to want to recognise is that regardless of how many good mares and good stallions are in the business, 50% of the foal crop as it comes to fruition is going to be rated 70 or less. All those top stables will sell the horses they think are not going to be very good as quickly
as they can.
“When I was in Hong Kong, I was part of a syndicate that bought one of those horses; a former Coolmore inmate that ran three times in three weeks as a two-year-old, won on heavy ground and was sold to the guy who ran the syndicate – who I never forgave – for £350,000. He eventually won a Class 5 in Hong Kong. But that’s how good it was.
“However, if there’s nobody there to pick up those horses, what’s going to happen? The only people who buy these horses are at the lower end of the sport. I’ve had it said it to me many times that such owners are only interested in a day out and a good lunch. That’s demeaning, elitist and a snub to the people who have a real love of horseracing. They want to get involved but can’t afford to buy at the top end.
“If you don’t invest something back into the sport for these owners, they are going to disappear. As they disappear, the demand for horses generally will go down. Now we are told that the foal crop is falling. How do you arrest that fall? Well, you increase the demand for foals. You don’t reduce the supply of foals to try and meet the falling demand. That’s crazy.
“We must increase the demand for foals and horses at that level. That means pulling people into the sport and increasing the number of owners. The only way that you’re going to be able to do that in this kind of economic environment is by providing more prize-money at the bottom end.
“There’s also the equine welfare angle. Plenty of people out there want to end horseracing. To give them the excuse to end the sport is the stupidest thing that racing could do. That’s the real danger on the horizon.
“Progress is being made in equine welfare, which is great. Many elements are coming together to ensure horses enjoy a prolonged life in not just racing but equine activity. The naysayers have no ground to stand on.
He continues: “The top end can take care of itself. I have no problem with doubling the Group 1 pots so long as they recognise they are making a big judgement about whether or not people who own in the lower tiers are going to stay in the sport for the same amount of money, year in, year out.”
Trouble and strife
The British racing industry is rarely without a crisis or two but the situation at present is particularly murky, with the British Horseracing Authority (BHA) searching for a new Chair after the Lord Allen debacle, Ascot declaring its intention to leave the Racecourse Association due to a perceived lack of progress on reform, and affordability checks threatening to blow up the betting landscape and levy collection system.
Conflicts around the globe are also impacting the sport, in particular the amount being invested at the sales.
Walker says: “If Ascot wanted everybody in other parts of the sport to get behind them, they would immediately say what they do with their racing income – media rights, income from hospitality, ticket sales and sponsorship, executive contribution – and say how they distribute it, proving to us that their model is the one to get behind. But they haven’t.
“None of the racecourses will come out and say, ‘this is how we distribute our money’. There is no transparency. An awful lot of the money coming into racecourses is from owners, not just entry fees but the fact that most of us are betting, meaning contributions to bookmakers and the levy. It’s just a different route for owners’ money to go into racing.
“It would be nice if the racecourses explained how much of their betting income, sponsorship money and media rights revenue is going back into prize-money.”
On Lord Allen’s failure to bring horsemen and racecourses together to realise the ambition of an independent BHA Board, Walker says: “If you insist on brining someone in who has no knowledge of the sport, you will always open yourself to potential disaster. Other businesses – media, retail or whatever it is – are very different to a sport. There were good intentions in bringing Lord Allen in as Chair, but it was naïve.
“Part of the problem is the person designing the job spec and advert for the candidates: if they get it wrong, you will get the wrong person. That’s like falling at the first hurdle.
“I’d like to see the regulator taking a much firmer grip of the industry and state the direction of travel. [BHA Chief Executive] Brant Dunshea has a tremendous track record; you need to start handing people like that a bit of power.”
One of the most popular questions posed to ROA Board members is ‘what are you doing about prize-money?’ Walker knows that the ROA’s powers in this area are limited yet acknowledges the organisation must press the rest of the sport to boost race funding.
“We must be clear on what we are demanding of the industry, and that is more prize-money for a start,” he says.
“The ROA must explain the case for supporting owners and ensure the racecourses and BHA understand where we’re coming from in saying we need more for the grass roots. For as long as I’m in this position, that’s the approach I’m going to take.
“Even if it’s a case of every race going up £1,000 – people have said it won’t make the blindest bit of difference. But it will! Every extra bit makes a difference.
“The regulator sets the minimum values; the market determines where we are. The number of owners is falling, therefore by definition the minimum value is too low.
“Every race should be run for a minimum of £8,000. We’re far too low. If we raise it by £2,000 and the same problem is in existence after a year or two of trying, you’re still too low. You need to keep increasing the level, until we find the equilibrium price where the same number of owners are staying in the sport.
“Now, some racecourses might say it’s too much for us – well, there’s your fixture list reductions. They simply disappear. It’s supply and demand in the real world, but they need to run their business efficiently – and I would
say profitably.
“When people are exiting the sport, that is a signal from the market that your price is too low.”
Homebred heroes
Walker may not have an outstanding Royal Ascot contender this year, although he hasn’t given up hope of producing one in future.
Subjectivist’s retirement to the stallion ranks has seen him invest in broodmares to support his Gold Cup hero, who now resides at Chapel Stud in Worcestershire.
There are three mares at present – a fourth died during the foaling process – which were bought in-foal, so far yielding a Without Parole two-year-old in training, yearlings by Study Of Man and Shaquille, and four foals all by Subjectivist from his second crop.
Despite the myriad challenges facing the sport, Walker has much to look forward to on the racecourse. After all, nothing beats the feeling of having a winner.
“It’s on different planet when things are going right – the world changes!” he says. “When things are going well the money is better too. After Subjectivist won the Gold Cup, I bought ten horses that year. I thought I might as well put the money back in.
“My wife says to me, ‘you’re the most pessimistic person I know when it comes to looking at economies and the state of the world, then when it’s racing, you’re the most optimistic person ever, especially if the horse has never run before!’
“You want to try for more when you’ve had some success. That’s the way this sport grips you… it’s crazy.”