The Tetrarch and a Meath connection

Anyone who was watching closely the action from the Curragh on Bank Holiday Monday would, doubtless, have noticed that one of the races on the card, which went off at around 4.20pm, was the 'Dick McCormick Irish EBF Tetrarch Stakes.'

The Listed race was named after a Meath man who made his mark in the world of horseracing and who worked with The Tetrarch, a legendary Irish-bred racehorse and sire that was foaled in Straffan Station Stud in Kildare in 1911.

The race, no doubt, was watched with intense interest by many punters, especially, those who might have wagered something, on the horse they had picked out to win.

However, few can have watched the the race unfold with the same emotional attachment as Dr Richard McCormick, the son of the said Dick McCormick.

A veterinary surgeon who specialises in horses, Dr Richard McCormick's practice is based in Dunboyne - and throughout his life he has been involved in the equine world in one way or another.

As well as being a vet he has also worked as a trainer and for a brief spell back in the 1960s he became Ireland's youngest ever horse trainer - but who exactly was his father, Dick McCormick, and why was there a race called after him?

THE DICK McCORMACK STORY

He was born in Clonmahon, Summerhill in 1894, the son of another renowned horseman, Mark McCormick.

As a youngster Dick learned to hone his own riding skills in the fields around Royal County with the likes of the Ward Union Hunt and the Meath Hunt. They were the kind of skills that were to serve him well later in his career.

To further his education young Dick went to work with Henry Seymour 'Atty' Persse, a famous trainer in Stockbridge, Hampshire, who was champion trainer in 1930.

The terms of his "indenture" or contract were strict to say the least.

"He shall not play cards or dice or other unlawful games, nor bet or gamble, nor frequent taverns or public houses," it stated.

An apprentice, it was added, "will not use bad language nor without leave absent himself from lock-up at night."

It was while working in the Persse yard that Dick McCormick came in contact with 'himself ' - the feared, the talented, The Tetrarch.

A notoriously temperamental horse who some believed was uncontrollable, The Tetrarch was ridden in races by the legendary Steve Donoghue who was champion jockey 10 times from 1910 to 1920 and won the English Derby six times.

While Donoghue managed to get the best out of The Tetrarch in competition the horse was only ever ridden out for his morning work by Dick McCormick.

In his autobiography 'Donoghue Up,' published in 1935, the champion jockey outlined how McCormick was "the only other man ever to sit on The Tetrarch's back long enough to stay up there."

Over the course of his career The Tetrarch, which had a grey coat sprinkled with white blotches, became known as "The Spotted Wonder."

He won all of his seven races he took part in during 1913 including the Woodcote Stakes and the Coventry Stakes as well as The National Breeders' Produce Stakes.

Injury however was to cut the The Tetrarch's career short and he didn't race after 1913.

Instead he went to stud becoming a very influential stallion. Famous horses such as Bold Ruler, Nasrullah, Secretariat and Spectacular Bid were among the many eminent sires which descend directly from his bloodline.

In 1937, when Donoghue stared his own training operation, he asked Dick McCormick to join him as his assistant-trainer.

It was widely accepted that McCormick, in reality, did the training. The partnership in their first year produced Rogerstone Castle, winner of the National Breeders' Produce Stakes at Sandown Park.

"Dick was the chief and only trainer while they were together," wrote journalist Patrick Murphy who penned an article on the life and times of Dick McCormick in the Meath Chronicle in May 1947.

At the outbreak of the World War Two Donoghue's training project was dissolved. McCormick returned to Ireland where he began to train in his own right, relying on what he had learned about horses up to then.

Initially he was "private trainer" to AP Reynolds in Clonbarron House Kildalkey.

The house and stables had previously belonged to Sir William Nelson and Lady Margaret Nelson who wrote herself into racing history in 1915 when she became the first lady owner of the Aintree Grand National winner - Ally Sloper.

The chairman of the Great Southern Railways, Reynolds was by the 1940s the owner of Clonbarron and he asked McCormick to take over the running of the establishment.

"In 1944 he (McCormick) turned out 10 winners with a dozen horses and in 1945 he had 11 winners with the same charges," wrote Murphy.

"Last year (1946) he had 19 with 14 horses in training....to train 40 winners in three seasons while never having a large string is no mean feat."

Among the races he won was the Phoenix Stakes, Beresford Stakes and the Irish Oaks.

When McCormick took over Clonbarron, Murphy noted, "it was in a bad shape." The trainer was required "to re-make the gallops, which are now some of the best in Ireland."

With the dissolution of the Clonbarron arrangement McCormick moved to the Curragh where he became a public trainer at the renowned Co Kildare training facility.

Over the years McCormick became famous for training fillies, particularly two-year-olds.

He won races such as two Phoenix Stakes, the Leopardstown Produce Stakes, the Beresford Stakes, three Maher nurseries, Madrid Free Handicap, and the Irish Oaks, all with fillies.

He also trained a number of what became regarded as high class apprentices including PJ Corrigan, P.J. Crosby, JT Farrelly and the very successful P.F Conlon.

THE RICHARD McCORMiCK STORY

When Dick McCormick passed away in 1963 his place was taken by his son Richard who suddenly becoming Ireland's youngest ever trainer.

"My father died in July 1963 and it was the week of the Galway races. I had planned to go to veterinary college in October and there we were with a yard of 12 or 15 horses and what are we going to do with them?" he recalled reflecting on that difficult time for the family.

"The Turf club said very kindly 'look we'll give you a temporary trainer's licence' which they did.

"I was only 16, but I went on to train a number of winners. Charlie Haughey was a client of my father's. He had a filly in our yard called Miss Cossie.

"She ran in the Irish Cambridgeshire for me, owned by him, and she finished second, fortunately she didn't win.

“If she had won I probably wouldn't have been allowed go to vet school."

Richard McCormick, who was born in Clonbarron, worked in America as a vet for a time before returning to Ireland to train horses full time from 1970 to 1982.

His most successful horse was a filly, Willy Willy. In October 1974 Willy Willy won the Doncaster Stakes with Lester Piggott up.

In time McCormick returned to his successful veterinary career basing himself once more in America where he was employed, from 1982 to '87 by German industrialist Dr Herber Schnapka as vice-president and general manager of Clermont Farms, Germanstown, New York.

He was responsible for 300 mares, six stallions and 50 racehorses-in-training.

He returned to set up his practice in Meath but also worked a one-year contract as the private stable veterinarian to HRH Prince Abdulaziz bin Fahd's racing stables in Saudi Arabia.

Once more he returned to Ireland and continues to operate his equine practice from Dunboyne. He is also a director of Belmont Equine Products.

When he reflects on his father's success as a trainer, Richard believes his focus on nutrition for the horses under his care - and the particularly the use of high-quality Canadian oats - was a major factor.

"He came from a long line of horsemen, but I knew nutrition was key with him, nutrition was absolutely everything.

"Whatever horsemanship skills he had he would have learned them from his father, but the nutrition he would have learned from Atty Persse. "He started to use Canadian oats in the 1920s, he didn't consider Irish or English oats good enough for racehorses."

Richard also feels one of his father's greatest achievements, perhaps his greatest, was the way he handled and cared for The Tetrarch, ensuring the horse went to stud and was then able to exert a long-lasting influence.

"Subsequently from 130 lifetime foals The Tetrarch founded a dynasty on both sides of the Atlantic," added Richard.

"Essential Quality, the favourite for the Kentucky Derby this year, and owned by Sheikh Mohammed is grey and directly descended from The Tetrarch.

"If my father wasn't around The Tetrarch probably wouldn't have been at stud so these horses wouldn't exist.

"So the silky skills of an 18-year-old from Summerhill has had an incredible effect on the worldwide stud book. Incredible.

"He was able to ride this horse, The Tetrarch at 18.

“At 18 you wouldn't be allowed to ride this horse today, he would be too valuable, that's how good my father was," he concluded.