He only got his licence as a trainer last Friday, but Joseph O'Brien added to his debut haul of four winners on Monday with more success at Clonmel tonight.
Oh Me Oh My won a maiden hurdle at a price of 4/1, overturning the red-hot 8/15 favourite Killarney Lakes. So far in his fledgling career as a trainer in his own right, O'Brien, aged 23, has only turned to someone outside of his family to ride for him on three occasions.
Two of those have won, with tonight's jockey Jody McGarvey joining Brian O'Connell as winners for O'Brien. Joseph's brother Donnacha and sister Anastasia have ridden the rest of his mounts so far. McGarvey is perhaps best known for being helped to stay in the saddle by fellow jockey Danny Mullins during a race in Roscommon.
Speaking to IrishRacing.com after tonight's race, O'Brien said; "I've had a great start. On Monday the races just suited the horses and it just happened like that, you couldn't have organised for something like that to happen. It was just a great start and we'll try and keep it going now."
O'Brien's fantastic start to his career came on Monday - where he won four races out of six across two cards, winning two races each at Listowel and at Gowran Park.
BBC commentator Cornelius Lysaght said "Joseph is hardly a rookie because he's been assisting his dad for some time, receiving credit for his part in a whole lot of successes. But to clock up four winners on your first day is still spectacular."
The BBC generally don't spend much time covering the goings on at Listowel and Gowran Park so the fact that their chief horse racing correspondant was giving his thoughts at all are a testament to the regard in which O'Brien is held.
He retired as a jockey at the age of 22 having achieved more than any 22-year-old in the history of racing. Teaming up with his father Aidan, Joseph's Group One wins spanned six countries and included the Derby, St Leger, 2000 Guineas, Irish Derby, three Irish 2,000 Guineas in-a-row, a Breeders' Cup Turf, a Grand Prix de Paris and a Dubai Sheema Classic.
Although he has only been an "official" trainer since last Friday - O'Brien has, in reality, been training horses for months. He just had to wait until he had the necessary courses completed to become a trainer in his own right so the horses ran in his father's name. (A bit like a football manager managing a team while waiting his UEFA A Licence really).
Even when he was winning Grade 1 races as a jockey for his father Aidan, the whispers around the paddock were that Joseph had the same gift as his old man. "He's a good jockey, but wait till this fella goes training" was the tone of a lot of the stuff you'd hear.
He trained Ivanovich Gorbatov to win the Triumph Hurdle at Cheltenham (pictured above - with jockey Barry Geraghty and owner JP McManus - who might be seeing in Joseph what he did in his father who trained Istabraq) back in March and plenty more since, but he's not taking anything for granted.
Even on one of the biggest day of his training career (so far)- he wasn't present at either of the tracks he saddled winners at. Instead - he was at Goffs sales where he spent €100,000 on a horse he intends to go jumping with.
As always, he's a man with his eye on the future.
