ON THIS DAY - 31st DECEMBER

On this day - in 1980 the jockey Silvestre de Sousa was born (in São Francisco do Maranhão, Brazil).

Amazingly de Sousa was 18 before he ever sat on a racehorse.  By chance he was introduced to Fausto Durso (one of the leading jockeys in São Paulo at the time). Durso suggested that de Sousa had the build of a jockey.

Yet in 2015 he won the British flat racing Champion Jockey's title and was 2nd the following year before becoming champion again in 2017.  This year (2021) he won the Nunthorpe Stakes on Winter Power.