Mick (Nobby) Clark

Article by Chris Pitt

National Hunt jockey Mick Clark, better known as Nobby Clark, rode 19 winners during a career lasting almost 25 years, retiring at the end of the 1974/75 season, having been associated with just one trainer throughout that time.

Born on June 15, 1936, Michael Charles Clark served his apprenticeship with George Vergette at Market Deeping between 1951 and 1956 and then took out a jump jockey’s licence. He rode his first winner on selling hurdler Solar Girl at Market Rasen on March 16, 1957. His second, another selling hurdler named Finisterre, followed at Southwell the next month.

Nobby rode a single winner in each of the next two seasons, but scored twice in 1959/60, including once on the best horse he rode during his career, Purple Silk. The agony of Purple Silk’s 1964 Grand National defeat by Team Spirit in the dying strides was still more than four years away when Nobby rode him to secure his first victory in the Walesby Novices’ Hurdle at Market Rasen on Boxing Day 1959. Stable jockey Johnny Kenneally rode Purple Silk next time out when finishing seventh in division two of the Gloucestershire Hurdle at Cheltenham in March, but Nobby was back on board when finishing second, beaten half a length, at Doncaster just five days after that Cheltenham run. 

Both Nobby’s winners for the 1960/61 campaign were courtesy of Vergette’s juvenile hurdler Dr Babs, at Market Rasen over Christmas and at Stratford at the end of April.

Purple Silk was switched to chasing during the 1961/62 season but not before Nobby had ridden him twice over hurdles, finishing second at Nottingham in early December, then turning out again 12 days later at Southwell to win comfortably by three lengths, that being Nobby’s sole’s success that season. It would be the last time he rode Purple Silk in a race and the better part of four years before he rode another winner.

That long-overdue next win, when it finally came, was gained on novice hurdler The Minstrel at Market Rasen on September 25, 1965. Besides being the tenth winner of Nobby’s career, resulting in his claim being cut from 7lb to 5lb, it was also the precursor to by far his best season, yielding seven winners, all of them for George Vergette. The Minstrel won twice more, both at Wetherby, in October and November; handicap hurdler April Shower III won twice within seven days at Cheltenham and Haydock; selling hurdler Beau Nash obliged at Southwell over Easter, and Golden Admiral scored at Stratford at the end of April.

Vergette’s handicap hurdlers Pure Gem and Grey Imp were Nobby’s only two winners in the 1966/67 season, and there would be just one more, also for Vergette, that being selling hurdler Over Sleep, who justified favouritism when winning at Wetherby on Saturday, March 9, 1968.

He continued riding, albeit less often, for seven more seasons but rode no more winners. After relinquishing his jockey’s licence, he continued to work for Vergette, living nearby in Market Deeping.

Mick ‘Nobby’ Clark’s winners were, in chronological order:

1. Solar Girl, Market Rasen, March 16, 1957

2. Finisterre, Southwell, April 18, 1957

3. Coquelin, Plumpton, February 19, 1958

4. Misty Devil, Huntingdon, May 18, 1959

5. Flow, Huntingdon, October 24, 1959

6. Purple Silk, Market Rasen, December 26, 1959

7. Dr Babs, Market Rasen, December 27, 1960

8. Dr Babs, Stratford-on-Avon, April 29, 1961

9. Purple Silk, Southwell, December 16, 1961

10. The Minstrel, Market Rasen, September 25, 1965

11. The Minstrel, Wetherby, October 14, 1965

12. The Minstrel, Wetherby, November 6, 1965

13. April Shower III, Cheltenham, January 26, 1966

14. April Shower III, Haydock Park, February 2, 1966

15. Beau Nash, Southwell, April 9, 1966

16. Golden Admiral, Stratford-on-Avon, April 28, 1966

17. Pure Gem, Warwick, November 29, 1966

18. Grey Imp, Doncaster, March 7, 1967

19. Over Sleep, Wetherby, March 9, 1968