PPORA AWARD WINNERS 2025/2026

The PPORA again recognised five winners for the 2025/2026 point-to-point season at the

National Point-to-Point Awards, which took place at the Panoramic Restaurant at Cheltenham Racecourse on Saturday 27th June. The PPORA Awards are designed to celebrate achievement at all levels of the sport, from jockeys who have not ridden a winner before the start of the season, to success in the PPORA-supported races, to lifetime achievement. A full list of winners, along with a brief biography, is below.

CHAMPION PPORA RIDER AWARD (MOST POINTS WON IN PPORA RACES)

GINA ANDREWS

Gina Andrews - legend of the sport (Neale Blackburn)

Gina Andrews should need no introduction. 12-times female champion point-to-point jockey, she has ridden 471 winners between the flags – by far the most of any female rider – along with over 100 under rules, making her the most successful British woman jockey over jumps of all time, amateur or professional. Career highlights include Cheltenham Festival success on Old Domesday Book, and winning the Aintree Foxhunters on Latenightpass, owned and bred by her mother-in-law Pippa Ellis. Andrews, who is married to former leading point-to-point jockey and trainer, and now licensed handler Tom Ellis, is also starting to make a name for herself in the point-to-point training ranks, having had nearly 100 winners in just over two seasons since she took over the running of the amateur side of the family operation, and finishing second and third in the national trainer standings in the past two seasons. Andrews won four PPORA races last season, two on Cheytac, and one each on Call Me Early and Cartesien.

CHAMPION PPORA OWNER AWARD (MOST POINTS WON IN PPORA RACES)

MR CLIFF MYERS

Cheytac winning a PPORA race at Fakenham for owner Cliff Myers (Graham Bishop)

Cliff Myers becomes leading PPPORA owner for the 2025-2026 season thanks to the exploits of his gelding Cheytac, who took PPORA races at Kingston Blount in February and Fakenham in March, having finished second at Chaddesley Corbett in December. The progressive seven-year-old went on to take a Dingley Open and – with five wins from his past six starts – looks one to keep an eye on next season. Cheytac is trained by Gina Andrews, and Myers has a long association with the Andrews family, having previously enjoyed success with Killinkere, and Can Mestret – a dual Hunter Chase winner and probably his best horse – who was trained by Andrews’ father Simon.

WILKINSON SWORD TROPHY (MALE NOVICE RIDER)

LUCAS MURPHY

Lucas Murphy with connections after winning the PPORA Novice Riders Championship Final (Neale Blackburn)

16-year-old Lucas Murphy enjoyed an outstanding debut season, riding eighteen winners in total to take the national male novice rider championship alongside the Wilkinson Sword Trophy for the leading male jockey not to have ridden a winner before the start of the season. Son of former Grand National-winning jockey Timmy, who won the race on Comply Or Die, Murphy had an extremely successful pony racing career before graduating to riding over fences. He rode his first winner – Bass Rock for his grandfather Raymond Anderson Green – in a PPORA race at Chaddesley Corbett in December, the first of three wins on the ten-year-old, and proof of his qualities can be demonstrated by the fact that his victories came for no less than 13 different trainers, including one each for his father and his mother. Murphy, already gaining a reputation as a shrewd judge of pace, won the PPORA Novice Riders Final at Edgcote on Talimar Pearl and other highlights of his campaign include a Lockinge treble and a Maisemore Park double.

PRINCESS ROYAL TROPHY (FEMALE NOVICE RIDER)

MOLLY ARMYTAGE

Molly Armytage after her first win on Illico De Cotte (Will Shields)

Molly Armytage, 20, rode three point-to-point winners last season to take the Princess Royal Trophy on countback from Cerys Sheehy. Her maiden success came on Illico De Cotte at Badbury Rings in February, followed two days later by her first Hunter Chase victory, on Enqarde at Leicester (at the bumper price of 50/1). Another with a Grand National-winning rider as a father – in her case racing journalist Marcus, who rode Mr Frisk to victory as an amateur – Armytage’s career really took off in 2025/2026, her fourth season in the saddle. She also enjoyed success on Slipway at Siddington and Baunmore Jet at Lockinge, and had more rides in a single campaign than she had in her first three years. Armytage, a student at Oxford Media & Business School, comes from a background steeped in racing – in addition to her father, her aunt is pioneering female jockey Gee and her uncle is former leading rider Mark Bradburne.

JIM MAHON AWARD FOR SERVICES TO POINT TO POINTING

FIONA NEEDHAM

Fiona receiving her award from last year's recipient John Sharp (PPA)

Fiona Needham was a worthy recipient of the Jim Mahon Award, having spent a lifetime in pointing. She has both ridden and trained a winner of the Cheltenham Foxhunters, having partnered her father Robin Tate’s Last Option to victory in 2002, then training the mare Sine Nomine to win in 2024, with John Dawson in the saddle. Fiona’s day job is General Manager and Clerk of the Course at Catterick, she is PPSA Area Chairperson for Yorkshire, and stepped down from the PPA Board earlier this year, having served a six-year term as an independent member. Her career as a jockey lasted over 20 years and involved 116 successes and – in addition to holding a permit to train under rules, winning the Lincolnshire National last season with former pointer Red Delta – she and her father train a handful of pointers at Hesketh Grange near Thirsk, where she plays a hand-on role and can often be found leading up at the races!