Williams reflects on career as landmark 75th win looms

Isabel Williams is part of an established Welsh horse racing family

Isabel Williams believes her next winner of the jump season will confirm her conviction she was right to pursue horse racing despite its dangers.

At 27 years of age Williams is already Wales' leading female jockey. Now she needs one more triumph to ride out her claim and become a fully-fledged professional.

A claim is a sliding-scale weight advantage for a horse ridden by a relatively inexperienced jockey. Once a conditional jockey has 75 career winners, they lose their claim and join the ranks of the elite.

Williams, of Llancarfan in the Vale of Glamorgan, has 74 winners and is eagerly awaiting her next success.

Her most recent win was at Doncaster on 1 March, riding Patriotik to victory in a three-mile hurdle.

"As the 75th creeps closer and you have another winner and another winner, all you want is more," says Williams.

"I've got one more win to ride out my claim and I suppose that's quite a big thing to do. I don't know the exact percentage of jockeys who get their licence and go on to ride out their claim, but I think it's pretty small."

Recent statistics have put the conversion figure from starting out as a conditional jockey to becoming a full, elite professional at between only 10 and 15%.

Reasons for jockeys quitting before gaining 75 winners include the demands of making the weight and the risks of sustaining serious injury.

Williams, the daughter of leading Welsh trainer Evan Williams, began riding ponies aged five and says the worst injury she has suffered in 658 career races was a fractured cheekbone.

"It wasn't even during the race, it was cantering up to the start and the horse decided he wanted to go faster than I wanted him to," she says.

"That was really sore, but other than that I've had no really serious injuries, touch wood."

The issue of rider safety in racing returned to the fore when 24-year-old Michael O'Sullivan, a Cheltenham Festival-winning jockey, died after injuries sustained in a fall at Thurles on 6 February.

"What happened to Michael O'Sullivan was heart-breaking – for his family, obviously, but also for everyone in racing because it touches everyone in a close-knit community," says Williams.

"And the reality is it can happen to anybody. But I suppose you can't think like that. You have to live your own life and do what you want to do.

"If you thought about the risks involved in anything, then you might never get in a car in the morning, or get on a plane to go on holiday. Yes, the sport is dangerous, but it is also made as safe as it can be."

Horse racing is one of the very few sports in which men and women compete against each other and according to British Horseracing Authority (BHA) figures, the percentage of all rides given to female jockeys increased from 5% to almost 10% between 2010 and 2021.

On the weekend on which International Women's Day is marked, 8 March, Williams believes horse racing has become more open and accessible to women wanting to compete at the top.

"I do enjoy being able to take on both men and women on a level playing field. It's one of the great things about our sport," she says.

"You feel like if you win, it's because you rode well. It's not about who you are or where you are from. It's an even race.

"I have never experienced any issues or barriers as a female jockey. People want you to do well, it's a supportive community, and racing is something I am really proud to be involved with."

Wales' point-to-point decline

Williams – whose younger sister Ellie, 25, is a successful amateur jockey – does have one concern, that the decline in point-to-point racing in Wales may restrict opportunities for young female riders in the future.

The Williams sisters began racing in point-to-point events and Isabel says: "The only thing I worry about for young girls is that when I started there was a big community of people doing point-to-point racing.

"That was a great entry point for young amateur riders because at most meetings there would be a race just for women and so girls had lots of chances to get a ride.

"But since Covid, point-to-point racing has declined and so that is problem."

Cheltenham Festival starts on Tuesday, 11 March, but Williams currently has no booked rides at the meeting, although she has won races at Cheltenham outside of the festival.

"It's our FA Cup final, our Wimbledon, a real spectacle where everyone wants to watch the best horses in the most competitive races.

"I won on Bold Plan at Cheltenham in an April meeting, so it's definitely a big ambition to ride and win at the festival.

"That and the Grand National, that would be the pinnacle."