We recently had the pleasure to grab an Interview with Ivan Furtado, the trainer who hails from Brazil. Ivan is on a Journey in British Racing, which has already taken him via Roger Charlton. He is now finding his feet as a trainer
Your journey to becoming a Trainer is very interesting, from Brazil to the UK. Can you tell us about your Journey and the Early day’s as a Rancher in Brazil?
As you know I was born into a family who had there own ranch in Brazil were we had a variety of different animals such as cows, sheep, chickens, pigs and of course horses. I started riding when I was very young perhaps as little as 4 years of age, I took a keen interest into the western style of riding such as barrel racing and lassoing, at this time my Grandad had a few racehorses which I would ride as well, since these days I got the bug for racing where it all started.
When you arrived in England, what were your aim’s and how did the opportunity with Jim Old come about?
I arrived in England after graduating from a university in brazil where I studied business, for a start the aim was to just improve on my English therefore I studied English language at a college in London. I found a job in a Italian restaurant, which helped me in my first year in England. At the same time I started to follow racing in England where I would often get the Racing Post, I applied for the stable staff job that he had advertised for. Kindly he gave me the job and that was my first introduction to racing in England.
You became Assistant to Roger Charlton and then Alan McCabe, have they had an influence on your training style and how did the two experiences differ?
I was very lucky to have the experience to work for two very successful trainers. Roger had a very good selection of horses therefore I was able to deal with like Al Kazeem, Cityscape and Time Test. Whilst my time working along side Alan McCabe, we were very successful on the all weather and with 2 year olds. Both experiences differentiate from each other due to the type of horses and owners that you train for. I learnt a lot from my time being assistant to both trainers and I am very thankful.
Back in 2015, you took the plunge to go Training alone. Was that a big risk?
Yes it was always a big risk, however the opportunity came along and I felt the time was right.
That year you had 15 winners and the winners have improved year on year. Is that because you have more horses or better quality horses or both?
I believe this is because of both, I have had the opportunity to train more horse each season. The focus is to keep improving the horses to continue my increase of winners.
What are your principle targets for the flat season ahead and how many horses do you have in the yard now?
My target is to keep all my horses healthy and up to their highest potential, which will result in more winners for the upcoming season ahead. We currently have about 50 horses in training.
What is an normal day for the yard and how do you relax away from the office?
A normal day would involve 5:30am feed, horses getting turned out and put on the walker during getting mucked out, most of the horses will be exercised during the morning finished off by there lunch time feed at 12:30 where they can relax in a quiet environment until the afternoon, this is followed by evening stables where the horses are fed, brushed and skipped out, checking their overall well being.
Unfortunately being a trainer is a very intense job, where relaxing doesn’t happen very often.
Finally, could you give our reader’s a couple of horse’s to follow please?
Frank’s Legacy is showing improvement day by day, while Murdanova has also progressed and a horse I think highly about. We also have some unnamed 2 year olds and they have also been showing great potential.
We would like to Thank Ivan for his time, wish him and his team all the best for a successful season ahead. We look forward to seeing Ivan’s runners in the Winner’s Enclosure in the very near future.
Interview by Rich Williams for arseonlinetips.
Pictures courtesy of Ivan Furtado.
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