Will Kia Joorabchian’s gamble pay off?

A generous new Levy deal would be nice, as would English-based trainers producing as many winners as their Irish counterparts at this year’s Cheltenham Festival. But perhaps the most important development for British racing in 2025 is that the massive gamble being taken by the 53-year-old Anglo-Iranian Kia Joorabchian should begin to pay off. Joorabchian, who has made a tidy fortune from investment companies and football dealings, has been a racehorse owner for more than 20 years and over 200 winners have carried his colours. Now he has committed himself to ambition on a totally different scale.

The catalyst, it seems, was the 2024 running of the seven-furlong Darley Dewhurst Stakes, a recognised indicator of horses likely to vie for the Classics of the following year. Joorabchian noted that two of the five runners in the race were owned by the Irish-based billionaire buddy group going by the name of Coolmore, and two by Godolphin, the operation headed by Dubai’s ruler Sheikh Mohammed. He says that if football’s top trophies went invariably to Manchester City and Liverpool it would be a boring sport and that more competition would stimulate more interest in racing. He argues that British racing doesn’t have enough new blood coming into it, that it has a prize money crisis and an attendance crisis. To that end, he splashed the cash in the 2024 sales season with a boldness we can all applaud, even if some see it as foolhardiness. He declares: ‘We have created some excitement: I hope we can inject a bit of life.’

Joorabchian spent £24 million-plus at Book One of the October yearling sale, more than either Coolmore or Godolphin, on 25 new recruits. The purchases included £4.62