9 minute read
Resurgent success
Liz Price chats with jockey Ioritz Mendizabal, who is enjoying a brilliant season in 2021 and happily admits that he has benefitted from the pandemic
IORITZ MENDIZABAL is a name that just rolls off your tongue. That is, if you are Basque. For everyone else it is a bit of a challenge and it takes Aidan O’Brien, who is very meticulous when it comes to names, two attempts before he gets it right.
“Ioritz is a very intelligent jockey,” he says after Mendizabal, who was born in Saint Sebastien, Spain, but who is based in the south-west of France, won the Group 1 Poule d’Essai des Poulains on board St Mark’s Basilica.
Back in May, O’Brien might have struggled to pronounce the name of the Basque jockey, who was enjoying only his second ride for the Ballydoyle team after finishing second on Lope Y Fernandez in the Group 1 Prix Jean Prat last year.
Since then though, O’Brien has had ample opportunity to practice his eloquence as Mendizabal has continued to guide his horses to one important victory after the next, offering him not only a first success in the Prix du Jockey-Club (G1) again on board St Mark’s Basilica, but also a first victory in the Prix de Diane Longines (G1) where he timed his ride on Joan Of Arc to perfection.
“He is very intelligent and such a nice person,” gushed the master of Ballydoyle after each of these Classic victories. Few people would disagree with him.
In France, where Mendizabal arrived at the tender age of 14 to begin his apprenticeship at the jockeys’ school in Mont-de-Marsan, which lies about two hours north from his home, the 47-year-old is known for being an extremely hard worker, very loyal and simply one of the nicest people in the weighing room.
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” he says clearly embarrassed, “but I do think you have to work hard and you must be loyal. Loyalty is extremely important to me. I’ll give you an example so that you see what I mean.
“Throughout my career, I have often ridden for Mark Johnston and one day he called me up to ask if I could ride in a Listed race in Germany.
“Now, to be honest, there is not a lot of prize-money on offer in Germany and I didn’t know if the filly could win, but I went anyway.
“I live in Pau so I had to get up at four in the morning, take the plane to Paris, then drive to Cologne, ride and then return. I think I got home about midnight and that is a long day.
“I got lucky and she did win by about a neck if I remember, but it wasn’t a given that she would win.
And he adds: “I have been very lucky. My parents gave me a good education and taught me many things, like being loyal, like not getting down when things go wrong and to pursue my goals.”
His father, who passed away five years ago, was a banker and his mother, who he calls nearly every day, was a teacher.
His father had dabbled a little in breeding horses, but they had no links at all to the horseracing industry.
Yet, they always supported their son in his desire to become a jockey and, although it was tough on this close-knit family, agreed to send him to France as a teenager.
“I always wanted to be a jockey,” remembers Mendizabal. “As a kid that is all I wanted to be, even though everyone knew I was going to be taller than the average jockey. But there were no jockey schools in Spain and so I went to France to the AFASEC school in Mont-de-Marson, which wasn’t easy.
Following three years of learning the ropes at the yard of Michel Laborde in Dax, in 1991 he joined the rapidly expanding yard of Jean-Claude Rouget at Pau where he initially became his go-to man for the races in the Provinces.
A few years later he was promoted to first jockey and started riding more and more often in Paris winning his first Group 1 race on Ask For The Moon in the Prix Saint-Alary in 2004.
That same year he also became champion jockey for the first time thanks to riding 220 winners; it was a new record at the time.
He lost the title the following year to Christophe Soumillon, who also broke the record, but Mendizabal knuckled down and his hard work was rewarded with three more championship titles in 2008, 2009 and 2010.
ALTHOUGH MENDIZABAL was very successful, the new decade promoted Soumillon to the number one jockey to Rouget’s yard and Mendizabal returned once more to riding mainly in the Provinces.
“I have always been labelled as a jockey for the Provinces,” confirms Mendizabal without the slightest hint of bitterness or regret.
“It was just one of those things. It didn’t matter, I did get to ride in Paris on a regular basis for a while and you have to just keep going.
“My adventure with Monsieur Rouget eventually came to an end about four years ago when I went freelance and I only have
In this job people don’t give you rides to please you, but just because you might not be fashionable, it doesn’t mean you must stop working hard or change the way you do things
good memories from the time I had there. “In fact, I can’t thank him enough for everything he did for me.”
It is rather typical of Mendizabal to accept rather than revolt, to be grateful rather than resentful for being overlooked in favour of someone else.
Many jockeys would have left the yard at that stage, but not Mandizabal.
“I firmly believe that in order to get anywhere in life, you must never ever be bitter towards anyone,” he says with conviction.
“You must leave the negative behind or you will stagnate. You must look up, always, even when it is hard. I have always been like that, and again it is something my parents gave me on my way and I am now trying to pass on to my two daughters.
“I don’t know if it is the right solution, but it works for me.”
If the first decade of the new millennium had allowed him to shine in the spotlight, thanks to his four champion jockeys’ titles, but also to a first Classic victory when the Eric Libaud-trained Vision d’Etat lifted the Prix du Jockey-Club in 2008, the second decade was undeniably a lot quieter.
“Things just died down and I honestly don’t know why,” muses Mendizabal. “You have to ask the people I was riding for why they chose different jockeys.
“You have to be true to yourself. Don’t put yourself under pressure, just do what you always did, unless obviously you have been making major mistakes!
“Otherwise, put your head down and continue. Things will turn around, they always do in racing.”
And he smiles: “Obviously it also helps to have good agents like Pierre-Alain Chereau and Shippy Ellis, because they certainly did a brilliant job when they got me the ride on Mishriff in last year’s Prix du Jockey-Club.”
Mendizabal still can’t believe that, of all the jockeys available, John Gosden chose him to ride Mishriff in the Prix du Jockey-Club. “We only really learned on Thursday before the race that the English and Irish jockeys wouldn’t be able to come to France to ride because of the pandemic.
“I knew that my agents had provided Mr Gosden with a list of names and I am still absolutely flabbergasted as to why he chose me.”
HE PAUSES and laughs: “But I am so incredibly grateful to him, because it just snowballed from there. Only a short while later I was called to ride for Aidan O’Brien in the Prix Jean Prat for the first time and then James Fanshawe contacted me to ride Audarya in the Prix Jean Romanet and we won!”
The pandemic, which made travelling between countries nearly impossible, has certainly worked in his favour, but it also cost him the ride on Audarya in the Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Turf as he tested positive for COVID just as he was about to take off for Keeneland.
“Look, I’m not kidding myself,” he says with the same matter of fact attitude that he displays in all of his views. “I know that I would have never ridden these fabulous horses if travelling to France had remained an option for the English and Irish jockeys.
Mendizabal certainly did more than just get on with it. Riding out of his skin, he has now won three Classic races in France, including the prestigious Prix de Diane Longines and, based on O’Brien’s comments, who is obviously very taken by the Basque, it would be no surprise to see him donning the famous Coolmore silks again in the future.
Although, in typical Mendizabal fashion, he would never dare to count on it.
“I am so very, very honoured to ride for Monsieur O’Brien and it is such a pleasure to ride these fantastic horses.
“I am absolutely in awe of St Mark’s Basilica, who is the most confident horse you could find.
“He is so incredibly calm, it’s unbelievable. It is because he can unwind so rapidly that I was able to ask him to come forward at the early stages of the Jockey-Club. I knew he would relax again once he was in position.
“There are not many horses you can ask to do what he did. He has such an amazing temperament; he really is a champion.
“I’m sure he will enjoy a great future, just like Joan Of Arc, who is such a tough fighter. They are amazing horses.
“And obviously, I will always have a soft spot for Mishriff, who has gone on to such extraordinary things.
“I happened to be riding in Riyadh and also in Dubai and, after he won, I went to find him to give him a kiss and to say thank you for everything he has given me.”
And this is precisely why Mendizabal is so appreciated in France. Because he cares, because he’s loyal, true to himself and always grateful.
And because he is just a very nice guy who also happens to ride some very fine races.
Mendizabal’s recent run of top class rides stems from riding Mishriff last year – the jockey made a point of finding the son of Make Believe after he won in Dubai to gave him a thank you kiss
