Recent years have seen horse racing come under rising financial pressure, with the increasingly competitive nature of the sports and entertainment industry, in addition to the impact of affordability checks, placing a strain on the sport. There have been small shoots of recovery in some areas, with the introduction of Premier Race Days hoped to have a lasting positive impact. However, whenever an optimistic strand arises, a dose of realism is never far behind.
April brought the news that yet another trainer was no longer able to make racing pay as a viable career in the modern climate – Northumbria-based handler Rose Dobbin being the latest to call it a day.
The End of a 15-Year Career
A graduate of Edinburgh University, 45-year-old Dobbin took her first steps into racing by spending two years working around the major training establishment of Lambourn – including at the yard of Nicky Henderson.
In addition to learning the training ropes, Dobbin was a talented rider, picking up 56 winners under rules, 44 in the Point-to-Point sphere, and winning the Women’s Amateur Championship on three occasions.
2009 saw Rose head north to embark on her training career. Setting up residence at South Hazelrigg near Alnwick, on land owned by her father Duncan Davidson. Duncan, incidentally, is the man behind the housing giant Persimmon Homes – a company he named in honour of the 1896 Derby winner – racing would appear to be in Rose’s genes.
Initially working in partnership with her ex-husband – the Grand National winning rider Tony Dobbin – Rose kept the business running under her name following the couple’s divorce.
Now, 14 years after picking up her first winner with Mirage Dor (whom she had previously ridden to finish second in the Coral Cup at the Cheltenham Festival), Dobbin has decided to move on to pastures new. Following a drop in numbers and only eight winners during the 2023/24 season, the reason is an all too familiar one, with Rose stating,
“There are various different reasons, but our numbers are down, and it’s not making sense financially. You can’t keep losing money year on year.”
Biggest Wins
Dobbin departs having racked up just under 200 winners as a trainer, with a career-best tally of 25 coming in the 2017/18 season. Most of those wins came at the lower-key meetings, but there were notable highlights along the way.
Dobbins’ only Graded winner came courtesy of Jonniesofa in the 2016 edition of the Grade 2 Albert Bartlett Novices Hurdle at Haydock (a key trial for the race of the same name at the Cheltenham Festival). The 2019 Scottish Borders National success of Bigirononhiship was particularly poignant, with the horse running in the colours of her father, but her finest training performance came when bringing the notoriously fragile Rocking Blues out of retirement to land the 2016 Eider Chase.
