Seven of the best for Jim Crowley

Jim Crowley’s link-up with the late Sheikh Hamdan Al Maktoum proved pivotal in transforming the career of the former journeyman jump jockey into a regular in the Group One winner’s enclosure. His first top-level success came aboard Prohibit in the then King’s Stand Stakes in 2011 and while that one does not make the list, we have picked out seven other superstars of the rider’s career.

The only non-Group One-winner to make the list, Al Aasy makes the cut by virtue of his eight Group Three wins for Crowley, who admitted the William Haggas-trained gelding had a special place in his heart. In fact Al Aasy came within a neck of top-level glory in the 2021 Coronation Cup and while he ultimately was found lacking in that calibre, Al Aasy triumphed at Group Three level in five out of six seasons between 2020 and 2025.

Far and away the best horse Crowley ever rode on ratings, Baaeed bowed out the winner of 10 of his 11 starts, with his only blemish coming on his swansong when easy Ascot ground proved his undoing. Crowley rode him in all but two of his races, with William Haggas successfully working him through the grades from Listed glory in July 2021 to Prix du Moulin gold just two months later. That race kick-started a six-race unbeaten run at the highest level, culminating in a six-and-a-half-length stroll when upped to 10 furlongs in the Juddmonte International. It was a shame he could not round out on a high in the Champion Stakes, but his final mark of 135 puts him among the greats.

Battaash fluffed his lines on more than one occasion, but when the Charlie Hills-trained gelding brought his A-game, there was little stopping him. Gelded as a juvenile due to his headstrong tendencies, he became a standing dish in the King George Stakes at Goodwood while securing a smattering of Group One wins – not least when blasting Dayjur’s course record time in winning the 2019 Nunthorpe at York on what Crowley described as one of his best days in the sport.

As Baaeed’s full brother, Hukum was always going to face a tough time in emulating his year-younger brother. However, he did indeed manage to hit the Group One heights, though he followed more in their sire Sea The Stars’ footsteps as a middle-distance runner. His top-level breakthrough came in the 2022 Coronation Cup but he then suffered a career-threatening injury that saw him miss the rest of the campaign. Expertly nursed back to health, Hukum returned in 2023 to emerge victorious after a humdinger of a finish to the King George VI And Queen Elizabeth Stakes showing grit aplenty to fend off Westover by a head.

Winner of the Gimcrack at two, Minzaal missed all but a few weeks of his three-year-old season after injuring himself in his box over the winter months. A third place on Champions Day underlined his potential though and the son of Mehmas duly shone at four, winning the Hackwood Stakes and finishing second in the Prix Maurice de Gheest before enjoying his turn in the Group One spotlight at Haydock. Fortune did not favour Minzaal though as he suffered a knee injury during the course of that Sprint Cup win and he was then retired to stud.

Mohaather was another who had little fitness luck as after winning two of his three juvenile runs and coming home a cosy winner of the Greenham, he suffered a setback that ruled him out of his Classic targets and kept him on the sidelines until Champions Day. Kept in training at four for the truncated Covid season, Mohaather suffered a nightmare run in the Queen Anne Stakes before roaring back to form in the Summer Mile, which proved a perfect springboard to Sussex Stakes glory at Goodwood. However, he suffered bone bruising during that victory which prompted connections to take a direct route to the breeding sheds.

The only horse on the list not to sport the famous Shadwell colours, Ulysses was the archetypal Sir Michael Stoute improver, with Crowley benefiting from what was a golden summer in 2017. He only rode the horse five times but that quintet of outings yielding placed runs in the Prince of Wales’s Stakes, King George VI And Queen Elizabeth Stakes and the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, plus Group One strikes in both the Eclipse and Juddmonte International. That he twice finished behind the great Enable merely underlines the calibre of opposition he faced.