Michael Thompson

Michael Thompson plays a pivotal role at Ballymore Stables based in Matamata. Michael's dad was a huge racing fan and often attended local meetings at Chester, Haydock and Aintree bringing Michael along with him. At eighteen, Michael had never touched a horse before he tried a college course introducing people to horses and racing. He was placed with George Moore in Yorkshire where he stayed for five years meeting some fantastic people including his wife Elle.

Michael enjoys being involved in the running of a busy stable and the extension of the Flemington base in Melbourne which creates exciting elements for horses, owners and staff to have options. A typical day begins at 3:15 am and at work by 4 am where they get straight cracking into getting horse to the track, saddling and swimming. Depending if it is a gallop morning Michael can be found recording times and getting feedback from riders, and on non-gallop mornings he tries to get as many videos as he can to send to owners for updates. After finishing at the track at roughly 9:30 am he heads to the office where he spends the rest of the day sending updates to owners, emails, and race planning. Michael has also spent the past season acting as a jockey agent for Niranjan Parmar, an experience he thoroughly enjoyed. Any spare moments are spent with his beautiful daughter Millie-Rose.

Racing can be a fickle thing at times, but the sun sets and rises every day providing a fresh day and you never know what tomorrow will bring. Michael finds joy in horses getting owners the success they deserve. He highlights Roch N Horse as the best example. She was bred by Sam and Catriona Williams at Little Avondale Stud. She started her career in Matamata with Ballymore before heading to Melbourne where she won the Group One Yulong Stud Newmarket and the Group One VRC Classic Darley Champion sprint (beating the world's best sprinter Nature Strip!). She has recently retired and returned to New Zealand to begin her next chapter as a broodmare where she will visit Proisir this year.

 Michael also has a strong interest in breeding, where he aims to breed quality middle/mile distance horses in the future. A few particular stallions in Europe he likes are Frankel who he thinks is the best example of a thoroughbred he has ever seen up close and Sea the Stars is his favourite racehorse. More locally in Australia, he highlights Alabama Express standing at Yulong and Satono Aladdin standing at Rich Hill Stud as stallions who will have bright futures and he would love to send mares to them.

Often a tricky one, Michael would like to see changes in the industry involving the hours and cost of ownership. 4 am/4:30 just isn’t appealing and especially when it's a split shift and then the limited time off warns a lot of people away from a future working in racing to fill the jobs needed. It inevitably also means that we are going to lose some staff because of the hours and the demand for the job. Ownerships are difficult with the amount of disposable income lessening all the time and the prices of racing horses going up. Syndications need to be celebrated and exposed more to those looking to get into racing and general viewers as it becomes a much more affordable way to get people involved with the complete thrill of racing horses for a fraction of the price.

Michael credits his reason for everything he does to his family and young daughter Millie-Rose. It’s a lot of sacrifice and limited free time but his beautiful daughter makes it all worth it. Through all of the hard work, it's because of the amazing life he and his wife Elle want to provide for her. Hailing from England, bought some challenges being here by themselves with their families being back in England but Millie-Rose makes it all worth it and they love New Zealand and believe that they can achieve everything they want to.