Run The Numbers – The ageless quality of Australia’s champion jockeys

With his 10th Melbourne jockeys’ premiership now secure, Craig Williams is now within one of the all-time record, held jointly by Roy Higgins and Billy Duncan. He also draws level with the legendary Damien Oliver.

But Williams also set a new mark as the oldest Melbourne premiership since at least 1950, and most likely of all time. At 49, he easily beats the previous mark held by 45-year-old Glen Boss in 2013/14, while Oliver was 43 when he won the last of his titles.

The achievement of still being at the top of his game on the brink of 50 is highlighted by the fact that the average age of a Victorian premiership-winning jockey since 1950 has been 31.8 years, with a median of 31.

With 21 years between his first and most recent premiership titles, Williams is second behind Oliver, who had 24 years between his first and 10th titles, for the longest successful span.

Having spent considerable time riding overseas in his early 20s, Williams had to wait until he was 28 before he won his first Victorian title, nine years older than Oliver was when he claimed his first crown.

Williams has now headed for his traditional trip to Ukraine and will finish his season on 65 winners, well clear of Jamie Mott with just one meeting remaining.

But Williams was not the only veteran jockey to wind back the clock and win a premiership this year.

In 1995/96, as Williams was still cutting his teeth as an apprentice jockey, an apprentice from Adelaide was catapulted to prominence when he claimed the Adelaide title.

A remarkable thirty seasons later, Jason Holder is back on top of the premiership list again, with a fourth success.

After 1995/96, Holder had to wait until 2003/04 for his second win, and then until 2015/16. A decade after his third win came his fourth in what is a triumph of persistence.

But the veteran hoop has endured an even longer wait for his fourth Group 1.    

Holder had three Group 1 wins to his name by the time he was 21 but has not added to his elite tally since the 1997 South Australian Derby, a drought which has now extended 29 years.

Over in Perth, William Pike will claim his 16th Perth jockeys’ premiership on Wednesday, having had 53 more winners than his nearest rival.

Pike, who turned 40 earlier this year and will be inducted into the WA Racing Hall of Fame on August 22, will also claim the national premiership for the seventh time, and will be leading metropolitan jockey in Australia for the fifth occasion.

That’s no mean feat, given second on that list is James McDonald, who will win the Sydney metro jockeys title for the 10th time, equalling the mark set by the legendary George Moore.

McDonald, 34, has broken a host of records this year, including Oliver’s all-time Australasian Group 1 record and Malcolm Johnston’s record for most Group 1s in a season.

In town, J-Mac has ridden 112 winners, 14.5 fewer than Pike, at an impressive strike rate of 24.7 per cent. That total of metro winners is 11 more than last season and four fewer than 2023/24.

Ben Thompson will claim his first Brisbane jockeys’ premiership, with 97.5 winners, 23 more than second-placed Ryan Moloney.

Thompson, 29, has returned from his 18-month stint in Hong Kong as a much more polished rider, and has not missed a beat. He has had more city rides than any other rider in the country this season.

He is in a clear second behind Pike in the overall national title with 160.5 wins this season, having been the second busiest jockey in the land in 2025/26, with 904 rides, nine fewer than WA-based Holly Nottle.

Irish-born jockey Erica Byrne Burke will claim her first Tasmanian metropolitan (and overall) jockeys’ premiership, with an impressive total of 83 wins, the highest of any Tasmanian-based jockey since Craig Newitt in 2018/19.

Rounding out the national premiership picture was Jarrod Todd, who won the Darwin premiership with 38 wins.

Given Byrne Burke is 27, and Todd is 38, the average age of a metro premiership-winning jockey in Australia this season is 38.14.

If you look at the top 10 metropolitan jockeys across Australia, that average age figure drops to 31.4. That total includes young guns Jabez Johnstone (20) and Zac Lloyd (22).