'When you're knocked out for over four minutes three times in eight months, the head can't take much more'

Lewis Porteous spoke to the Moores as part of our Great Racing Families series, first published exclusively for Racing Post Members' Club subscribers in June.

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There is a sense of 'the boy done good' on arrival at Gary Moore's Cisswood Stables near Horsham in West Sussex. 

Through the electric gates lie 165 acres of open countryside, housing 110 stables, a schooling arena and an impressive selection of gallops at a training centre to be proud of – especially if you are the son of a former used-car salesman from Brighton.  

Surrounded by family, Moore is at his happiest here. In fact, one of his pet hates is going racing, which to him is time wasted when he could be repairing, maintaining or adding to the facilities at Cisswood.    

Moore may need a pair of new shoulders and two new knees, but good luck pinning him down. He is a workaholic and a boss who leads by example. One minute he shuffles along sweeping the main yard, the next he's in a horse's box with his grooming brushes; this is the epitome of a hands-on trainer. 

"He doesn't take a day off which can be really frustrating," says his long-suffering wife Jayne, herself an integral part of the success of Cisswood. "He likes his job too much and I can't remember the last day he took off. He sets very high standards in looking after the horses. They have to be groomed every day and he'll be there joining in."

Gary is the figurehead of a family immersed in racing. His youngest son Josh recently joined his dad on the training licence at Cisswood after a successful but injury-prone career in the saddle; Josh's brother Jamie, who rode almost 1,000 winners over jumps before the doctors pulled him out of the ring for good, is another hands-on member of the team; and their sister Hayley lives just down the road but is more commonly found on the racecourse where her star continues to rise as a presenter and pundit.

Then there is the eldest of four siblings, Ryan. No-one could forget Ryan. Undisputedly the greatest Flat jockey of his generation, he might be an infrequent visitor to Cisswood but his achievements are cherished in this corner of West Sussex more than anywhere else.

So how did the boy from Brighton who once dreamed of being a professional footballer build such a formidable racing dynasty? Gary has his father, Charlie, to thank for the fact he deals in horsepower on the gallops every day rather than on the forecourt like his old man once did.  

Gary and Jayne Moore with sons Jamie and Josh at Cisswood Stables in West Sussex

"My dad got evacuated from Swindon to Brighton in the war where he became a car dealer," he explains. "One day he had to deliver a car to Birmingham and, after he'd done that, his boss told him to do what he liked for the rest of the day. He pulled in at a sale at Epsom racecourse on the way home just to see what was going on. 

"Apparently he was scratching his head and the auctioneer asked if that was a bid. Dad said, 'No', but the auctioneer tried to belittle him, so Dad turned around and said, 'For your rudeness, take it that it was a bid', and that was it. He'd bought this horse for £300. He didn't know where to put it but there was a guy called Josh Boyes who trained in Brighton, so he took the horse up there and that's where it all started."

By the time Gary was tottering around the family home opposite Brighton racecourse, his dad had leased a yard from the local council adjacent to the mile start and was training himself. Charlie built a reputation of turning the base metal of cheap and challenging horses into the gold of racecourse success. Occasionally he unearthed nuggets such as Lir, who beat Broadsword in the Aurelius Hurdle, and Royal Measure, who won at Cheltenham.

"The yard had nothing," says Gary. "There were three stables when he started but by the time he left there were 75. He never got planning permission for one of them. Half a dozen of the boxes would have been made properly but the rest he put up himself. 

"He must have spent a couple of years with Josh Boyes and learned what to do off him but Dad rode as well. He started off training jumpers and hated Flat racing but then my sister Candy came along and all he wanted to do was train Flat horses and she rode quite a lot of them, while I rode the jumpers."  

Moore describes his late father as someone who could be hard but, in the main, fair. Asked to elaborate, he vividly recalls one Saturday morning at the family yard in Brighton.

"It was hammering it down with rain and I said, 'I've got to go and play football for the school now, Dad'. He said, 'You're not playing football in the rain', but it was all right for me to ride out in it! He didn't let me go and I let the school down. I loved football and had just had trials for Brighton Boys but he was probably right and I wasn't good enough or tall enough, although I didn't think so at the time." 

From that moment it was horses rather than football for Gary and he went on to ride close to 200 winners over jumps, albeit at lower-level tracks aboard lower-level horses. When he wasn't winning he often found himself prostrate on the landing side of a fence or hurdle and falling off was something a rider operating in his grade swiftly became accustomed to. 

"The worst fall I got was when the horse landed on my face at Plumpton on bank holiday Monday," he recalls. "I was going out with a lovely bird at the time but I had the entire top row of my teeth kicked out and I haven't seen her since, but luckily I met Jayne." 

Despite the battering he took, Moore says he loved his time riding, more for the camaraderie, but in 1992 he quit the saddle to concentrate on his own training operation. His dad was still mopping up winners at Fontwell, Plumpton and Lingfield, but his biggest patron Ken Higson was keen to support Gary and set him up in Epsom. It’s been onwards and upwards ever since, although not plain sailing.

Gary Moore: "We took a massive leap coming to Cisswood Stables"

When Charlie's health deteriorated, his son moved back to the family yard in Brighton, improved the facilities and grew the numbers, but the lease on the yard was still owned by the council and there were too many imponderables to make it a safe bet from where to build a training business that Gary could one day pass to his children.    

In 2007, former trainer Charlie Cyzer offered Moore the chance to train for him at Cisswood but, for someone as fiercely independent as Gary, an arrangement like that would never have worked. Instead he flippantly offered to buy the place and six months later Cyzer accepted. 

"We took a massive leap coming up here from Brighton but you couldn't carry on training down there, training around the edge of a farmer's field and getting chased by everybody," says Jayne. "This opportunity arose and we grabbed it, which I thought we were insane to do at the time, but I'm glad we did." 

Gary adds: "Walking out of your house and straight into the yard was something I always dreamed about but never thought I'd have. We couldn't afford it but here we are. It's taken a lot of hard work and Jayne has just been amazing. She's the brains behind it and runs a very tight ship." 

He might not be a keen racegoer but there is no mistaking Moore’s popularity among owners. The stable, which had just 36 boxes when the family moved in, operates 12 months a year over jumps and on the Flat and there are times when the 110 boxes now at their disposal is not enough.  

Moore enjoyed his crowning moment when Sire De Grugy won the 2014 Champion Chase under Jamie, but just last season La Patron won a Grade 1, Salver, Editeur Du Gite and Botox Has a Grade 2 apiece and Nassalam turned the Welsh Grand National into a procession. 

Arguably the stable has never been stronger but there is already plenty of thought being given to getting stronger still in the future, when the focus might well tilt more towards the Flat.

By that time it’s likely to be the names of Josh and Jamie on the licence. Both have big ambitions for the place but taking on everything their parents have built comes with an unmistakable burden of responsibility.

"I wouldn't want it to slack from what Dad has done and it's got to be better," says Jamie. "I watch what Willie Mullins does and it's brilliant. You'd love to be doing that and I want us to have big wins all over the world. I want us to have runners in the Melbourne Cup and Breeders' Cup. Dad would love it if Josh could do that." 

It is not impossible Ryan will have a part to play in the future too. "Ryan was at the sales with them the other day, so he's already helping," says Gary. "He's their brother at the end of the day and all four kids get on really well."

Josh is also keen not to waste his older brother's knowledge. "Ryan is always good at suggesting things and, when we've had a nice Flat horse in the past, what he's suggested has usually been right. We're always able to call Ryan for advice and that's always a massive help. His knowledge is second to none."   

Ryan's glittering career is something the whole family takes pride in. He has won just about every major Flat race in the world, has the most coveted job in Flat racing as retained rider to the Coolmore partners and no-one is more respected in the weighing room.

Jamie Moore: "I want us to have runners in the Melbourne Cup and Breeders' Cup"

"He was a very natural rider straight away but he was natural at everything he did," says Jamie, who is just a year younger than his older brother and remembers a "brilliant" childhood playing football, badminton and squash with Ryan.  

"He's not arrogant at all but it's his way or no way. I remember when he won the Cox Plate on Adelaide. They were saying he can't win from that draw and said he had to go forward and make the running. But Ryan did exactly the opposite, dropped in last down the inner and it worked. That's what sets him apart. He's not scared of taking criticism if it goes wrong but most of the time it goes right. He's got loads of bottle and, for me, he's flawless." 

The words epitomise the fact the Moores are far more comfortable talking about each other than themselves. Modest, hard-working and down to earth, they are almost oblivious to their own achievements.  

"I wanted to achieve a lot more," says Jamie of a career in the saddle spanning more than 20 years, including five Grade 1 wins on Sire De Grugy alone. "When your two idols are Ryan Moore and Tony McCoy, you feel like an underachiever but I had a good career and, to still be walking after some of the injuries I've had, I've been lucky.

“I was gutted I had to retire and wanted to continue, mainly because my kids enjoyed watching me ride, but I had three spinal injuries and, when you're knocked out for over four minutes three times in eight months, the head can't take much more. It was sad but you've got to move on.”

They might be the youngest and oldest siblings but Gary thinks Josh and Ryan share similar personalities. With Jamie he sees more of himself, while Hayley is a hybrid of her parents. 

"If you get Josh and Ryan against you on something, you've got no chance," says Gary with a chuckle. "Josh would rather be in the office working things out, while Jamie would prefer to be out in the yard. Jamie gives it the hard man but he's the kindest-hearted person you will ever come across.

"Ryan is totally different. He's thinking all the time and is very bright. I know he's hard work for you guys [in the press] but people should listen to him more. He knows so much; it wouldn't surprise me if he tried to run the country one day! He keeps himself in good company but you wouldn't know him until you sat down and talked to him for a while." 

As for his only daughter Hayley, whose partner is leading jockey Tom Queally, Gary says: "She's very professional and very dedicated, which is what has got her to where she is today. She's a good kid and I can see a fair bit of Jayne in her but a bit of me as well. The one thing they all have is a healthy work ethic and I think that comes from my mum, Lorna, who was an amazing lady." 

Gary is rightly proud of all four of his children, although he blames himself that Josh perhaps didn't fulfil his full potential in the saddle. While Ryan served his apprenticeship with Richard Hannon and Jamie was quick out of the blocks to join Martin Pipe at 17, Josh was always based with his father during his riding career and Gary thinks he should have insisted he spread his wings. 

Josh Moore: joint-trainer at Cisswood along with his father Gary

"My kids are my greatest achievement," he says. "They've all done very well for themselves but the one thing that hurts me is that Josh never got to prove how good he was and, believe me, he was very good.  

"It's probably my fault for letting him stay working for me. He should have been in Lambourn but hopefully he and Jamie will take it to another level in the training ranks."  

When Josh suffered a career-ending fall at Haydock on April 16, 2022, he came perilously close to losing his life. Placed in an induced coma, at one point doctors felt there was nothing more they could do for the stricken rider. However, his mum insisted to anyone who would listen that he had developed a rare condition called fat embolism syndrome and that a recovery was not beyond him. She was right and Josh came back from the brink. 

Gary describes the ten weeks his youngest son was in hospital as the hardest of his life, but the way an already close family became one in adversity highlights better than any words the calibre of the Moores. 

"I have to thank my wife for what she did, Josh's partner Phoebe and the doctors and nurses in Liverpool for bringing him back," says the 67-year-old. "He was two hours away from dying which would have killed me. Until that happens you don't know how much you love your kids. His car was parked outside my house and coming out and seeing it there every morning was hard to deal with. It was only Jayne who gave me confidence he'd be all right and she and Phoebe stayed up there with him. 

"The only thing that matters is that Josh and Jamie are here after what they've been through and that they're both healthy and can live a full life."     

The Moore family might have stumbled into racing by chance, but the sport wouldn’t be the same without them. And with nine grandchildren and a tenth on the way, Gary can sleep easy knowing the name will live long into the future. Not that he is going anywhere anytime soon. After all, the yard isn't going to sweep itself.

Read more from the Great Racing Families series:

'There's great pride within the family - and the tide of Willie's success has raised the boats of our careers' 

'I was a bit wild, a bit too wild, and I was seriously bankrupt - but I just kept kicking on' 

'For him to be shot down in the war and then raise a family and see this, I think he'd be immensely proud' 

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