John Robert Bryan was born on November 17, 1959, at Kinnersley; not the famous Rimell establishment, but the village of the same name located between Hereford and Brecon.
With his father having been successful in the showjumping world, it was long odds-on that he would be riding almost before he could walk. Such was the case and, after graduating through the usual pony club, gymkhana and show jumping arenas, he had his first ride in a point-to-point at the tender age of fourteen. His first winner came the next season (1975) on Mrs Pam Morris’s Jim Lad in the North Shropshire Restricted Open at Eyton-on-Severn.
It was Jim Lad who provided him with his first major success between the flags when taking the 1976 Lady Dudley Cup at Chaddesley Corbett, a race long regarded as the Cheltenham Gold Cup of point-to-point racing. John won it again the following year on Little Fleur.
In 1978, although still only eighteen, John was champion point-to-point rider with a record 32 wins, beating by two the previous highest score set by David Turner the year before. His victories that year included the four-mile Lord Ashton of Hyde’s Cup at Stow-on-the-Wold aboard Mrs Morris’s Sparkford.
Though only runner-up to Turner in the 1979 season, John achieved notable successes on Sparkford, notching a third Lady Dudley Cup and scoring hunter chase victories over three miles at Ludlow and four miles at Cheltenham.
Though primarily riding in hunter chases, his first winner under National Hunt rules came against professionals in a Southwell selling hurdle, aboard 14/1 shot Celebrity Squares on March 12, 1970 (exactly one month before his Ludlow victory on Sparkford).
The following October, John was presented with what must rate as his easiest winner under NH rules on Little Fleur in the three-horse Downton Amateur Riders’ Chase at Ludlow. Both his rivals slipped up on the bend after the third fence, and while their jockeys eventually remounted and set off in vain pursuit, Little Fleur “made rest at a steady canter”, according to the form book.
The 1980 season saw a repeat victory for John and Sparkford in the valuable Cheltenham four-miler (The Range Rover Trophy) at the hunter chase meeting, while the veteran Jim Lad scored twice, at Hereford and at Worcester.
By the 1983 season, John was concentrating more on riding under rules. His two hunter chase victories added to a total of just seven in points, although he did produce what some considered the riding performance of the season when persuading Shalto to win the Clifton-on-Teme Restricted Open after the horse had been pulled up on his seven previous outings!
With 114 point-to-point and seven hunter chase winners behind him, John decided he may as well try to earn a living by becoming a professional jockey. He thus joined the paid ranks for the start of the 1983/84 campaign.
Though his professional career never looked like fulfilling championship aspirations, he rode consistently for local trainers such as Colin Jackson, Richard Hickman and Mrs Gill Jones. There were also the inevitable injuries, the worst being sustained in a Bangor novices’ chase in November 1987, when Tom Bailey’s Go Anna Go fell fatally at the eighth fence and John cracked two vertebrae. That rendered him out of action for most of the season, during which he rode only two winners.
However, the following season was altogether better with six winners, the best of which was on Mercy Rimell’s Eton Rouge in Haydock’s Greenall Whitley Chase, March 4, 1989, giving John his biggest success in the saddle. That same horse also gave him a great ride over the Grand National fences when finishing second to Villierstown in the John Hughes Memorial Chase, better known as the Topham Trophy.
After retiring from riding, John trained on a small scale. During his later years as a jockey, he had also learned the art of saddlery and he and his wife Sally ran a shop at their home in the village of Cradley, near Malvern. They also had as few Arabian horses to keep them occupied.
