You don’t have to be a brilliant rider to make it as a trainer. As jump jockeys, Paul Nicholls and Philip Hobbs never rose above the middle ranks. Both have since proved to be exceptional at training jumpers. In ten years as a jump jockey Tom Dascombe rode only 96 winners, but as a trainer he is making his mark a lot faster.
Unlike Nicholls and Hobbs, though, and despite spending five years with leading jumps trainer Martin Pipe, whom he rates as ‘a genius’, Tom is concentrating on training Flat horses.
The explanation lies in simple economics: ‘I started buying all my horses on spec [without having been commissioned to do so by owners]. It can take a time to find them owners. That’s all right with yearlings for the Flat, but if you buy six jumpers and start looking for owners you could have four of them broken down before you sell them. The established National Hunt trainers have a proper client base. If I had bought jumpers to start with I could have been finished by now.’
Before setting up on his own as a trainer, Tom, who was three years as an assistant to Ralph Beckett, worked plenty of experience into his CV. There was track riding at Churchill Downs in Kentucky, a job in Florida breaking yearlings, time as a bloodstock agent and, crucially, a period working with the South African trainer Mike de Kock looking after the horses he always sends to Dubai.
Tom met de Kock when he took a couple of horses to Dubai for Beckett. Not only did the South African improve Dascombe’s golf, he also entrusted him with a team of 16 who won eight races in their 22 outings, collecting $3.6
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