Ronald Young

Ronald Young

Article by Alan Trout

Ronald Christian Young was one of a small group of jockeys who started their careers during the Second World War but did not ride the first of his three winners until after the conflict. 

His first ride in public did not go well, as Right Saint was a faller in the Dove Maiden Hurdle at Southwell on February 17, 1941. He began riding again in February 1945 and recorded his first win on October 25 of that year. It came at Fontwell Park where National Hope was a decisive winner of the Chichester Hurdle, leading all the way and beating Adam’s Bridge by 15 lengths, despite carrying 4lb overweight. 

Owned and trained by Captain John Norris, it was the six-year-old’s first win at the eighth attempt. Ronald had only one more ride on National Hope that season, finishing fourth.

By the following season he was training Captain Norris’s small string of horses, based at Stonebury Farm, Buntingford, in Hertfordshire. He had his second victory as a jockey when Winning Plan took the Dover Handicap Hurdle at Wye on October 7, 1946 by a length. Exactly two weeks later came a third, and final, victory when National Hope beat three rivals in the Portland Novices’ Chase at Southwell by ten lengths. 

Ronald’s career ended as it had begun, with a fall, this time on Mister Marco at Huntingdon on October 23, 1948. He relinquished his trainer’s licence soon after.  

Ronald Young, born on 12 August 1920, died in July 1973 at Newmarket. He was 52.