After more than 60 years in racing as a jockey and a successful trainer, Pat Hyland has retired.
Ill-health has forced Hyland to step away from a training partnership with his son Chris to spend time on his farm in rural Victoria.
Inducted into the Australian Racing Hall of Fame in 2016, Hyland is one of only eight jockeys to have won Australian racing’s grand slam – the Melbourne Cup, Caulfield Cup, Cox Plate and Golden Slipper.
Hyland won the first $1 million Melbourne Cup aboard the Lloyd Williams-owned What A Nuisance in 1985 before five years later retiring to take up training.
He was also associated with the champion sprinter, and later sire, Vain who raced 14 times for 12 wins, claiming the 1969 Golden Slipper.
Hyland’s first good horse as a trainer was Saleous , winner of the 1995 VRC Oaks and he continued to have Group One success with horses like Zarita and Bonaria.
Scaling back his team, Hyland joined Chris at the start of the 2018-19 season before retiring earlier this month.
“He rode trackwork until he was 74 and then he slowed down a little bit in the last few years,” Chris Hyland told RSN927.
“He’s had a few little health issues, but overall he’s not too bad at the moment.”
