When it comes to popular sports like football, basketball, and tennis, many of these professional athletes make a ton of money. However, lots of people don’t realise just how much horse racing jockeys make. In fact, the cream of the crop are some of the highest-paid athletes on the planet!
Whether you love watching a race on TV or head to The Grand National, you’re sure to have an interest in how much jockeys actually make. Horse racing is largely popular with bettors, which makes it the perfect sport where you too can earn a fortune. Here we will explore who the wealthiest horse racing jockeys are in the world.
Yutaka Take
When we talk about money, Japanese racing is certainly on top of the world. If you would like to compare horse racing to any other sport in regard to salary, Yutaka Take is definitely the ideal candidate to concentrate on. Yutaka Take has earned over £600 million over the course of his extensive career. During his time as a horse racing jockey, Take has won over 4,200 races!
Although Take may not be well known on these shores, the star is a living legend in his native Japan and holds countless all-time records. What’s more, Take followed in the footsteps of his dad, Kunihiko, who was also a famed jockey. While we can’t say you’ll earn even 1% of what Take has, you can check out this newly discovered resource to find online casinos that could see you score money jackpots!
Bill Shoemaker
Bill Shoemaker, otherwise known as Willie Shoemaker, was born in the United States in 1931. If you’re a horse racing fanatic, Shoemaker may have passed your lips once or twice. This is because he was known as the greatest American jockey during the second half of the 20th century.
Shoemaker had accumulated more than 40,000 career races between 1949 and 1990. Overall, this horse racing jockey legend made over £195 million. Shoemaker’s long career spanned four decades where he won 8,833 races. The star also won the Kentucky Derby an impressive 4 times in 3 different decades! Shoemaker also secured several wins at the Belmont Stakes and Preakness Stakes too.
Sir Gordon Richards
Sir Gordon Richards was a 26-time Champion jockey. The star benefited from both a lucrative and long career. In the biography ‘Knight of the Turf’, Michael Seth-Smith stated that Gordon earned a significantly large income that was in the figure of £20,000 a year in the 1950s.
If we are to use standard inflationary calculations, an annual salary of £10,000 would equate to £548,000 in modern money. And should Richards have been horse racing in the 21st century, he could have earned an impressive £1 million each year.
Lester Piggott
Unlike many of the horse racing jockeys listed, Lester Piggott never disclosed financial information with either Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, nor his biographer Dick Francis. However, he definitely has a spot on our list. Piggott had at several advantages over his predecessors. The first being he was able to enjoy and benefit from the first wave of international racing. Also, Piggott was likely the first jockey to be given lucrative stallion nominations.
Piggott’s secrecy regarding his finances soon caught up with him. In 1987, the star was imprisoned for tax evasion which finally gave light on how much the star had. Piggott’s estimated fortune then was estimated to be £20 million.
Christophe Lemaire
Christophe Lemaire launched his horse racing jockey career in 1999. Since then, he’s earned a huge sum of money. While he began his career slowly and it took him considerable time to become profitable, everything was definitely more than worth it in the end. In fact, Lemaire enjoyed very lucrative years in 2017 and 2018 where his winning streak made him roughly $50 million from wins and place money!
Lemaire is a Japanese-based horse racing jockey that’s at the pinnacle of the highest-paid jockeys of all time. The beginning of his professional horse racing career began in France where experts believed he earned roughly £6 million. Before long, he switched to Japan which was his second home for over a decade. During this time, he made around £70 million. Over the years, Lemaire has switched places and competed in numerous tournaments. It’s estimated that his overall career earnings are in the £250 million region.
Javier Castellano
While the Japan-based races are arguably the top-paying events in the horse racing realm, the US still has some jockeys that earn a lot of cash. Take Javier Castellano for instance. He has been active on the US scene for over 20 years and made an impressive career out of the sport.
Launching his career in Venezuela in 1997, Castellano later switched to the US. This horse racing legend has a string of trophies to his name, including the Eclipse Award. Castellano is also a money leader. In fact, between 2013 and 2016, Castellano’s earnings were said to be around £300 million!
John Velazquez
Predominantly known by his nickname ‘Jonny V’, John Velazquez is actually 6 years older than Castellano. What’s more, the horse racing jockey has over 5,000 career starts in America notched on his belt. Velazquez is certainly leading the all-time money list. Just like most professional jockeys, Velazquez’s wealth comes from being involved in Japanese and modern-day US racing.
Velazquez’s lifetime earnings are estimated to be around the £350 million region which ranks him high among the wealthiest horse racing jockeys in the world. Not only is this figure astounding, Velazquez has impressive statistics to match. These include 33,350 rides and total wins of 6,089!
When you factor in how many millions watch and bet on horse racing, it shouldn’t come as a surprise to learn how much the jockeys make at the end of it. Horse racing jockeys compete for eye-watering sums of cash. And while a large chunk of their winnings goes to the horse’s owner, many of them have still racked up incredible sums over the years.
