Jenny Pitman

Pitman grew up on her family's farm near Hoby, Leicestershire, the fourth of seven children. Her father, George, was a tenant farmer who "kept a few of everything". The farm had no electricity, gas supply or mains water. She was brought up assisting in manual farm work, where horse powered equipment was a novelty, and learned to ride a pony "so young that being on horseback seemed as natural as walking". In 1957 she left the Hoby village school to attend Sarson Secondary Modern Girls' School in Melton Mowbray. She sustained a fractured skull when a showjumping pole fell on her head during a gymkhana at Syston and it was many months before the resultant convulsions were diagnosed. At the age of 14, she obtained a weekend and school holiday job at Brooksby Grange horse racing yard. Pitman left school two weeks before her 15th birthday, taking up a position as a stable girl at Brooksby Grange for a weekly wage of £3 4s 5d. Her first overnight stop was at Manchester where her filly, Star Princess, won the 1962 Diomedes Handicap. Two years later she changed employers, moving to a stable in Bishop's Cleeve, Gloucestershire, the first time she had lived away from her Leicestershire home. ==Career==

Pitman worked at Bishop's Cleeve for two years. One day, she was returning from a workout on the local gallops when her horse was spooked by a cyclist travelling around a corner too fast and on the wrong side of the road; the cyclist was jockey Richard Pitman. Jenny's initial reaction to Pitman was unfavourable, but later, when Richard obtained a job in Lambourn, Berkshire at Fred Winter's training stables from Bishop's Cleeve, Jenny was persuaded to apply for a job in Lambourn with Major Champneys at Church Farm Stables. She moved there in 1964. After the breakdown of her marriage the next year, she bought out Richard's share and continued to run the yard, which grew from 19 to 80 boxes. She was to win one other Grand National with Royal Athlete in 1995, although her horse Esha Ness was first past the post in the void National of 1993. In 1998 she was appointed OBE for services to horseracing. She retired from training racehorses in 1999, handing over the reins to her son, Mark. Later that year she was the first winner of the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Helen Rollason Award. Although still seen at the races, she is now a prolific writer of novels, principally with a racing spin. In 2017 she became a member of the Disciplinary Panel and Licensing Committee of the British Horseracing Authority == Personal life ==

Aged 19, she married Richard Pitman. In August 1966, their son Mark was born and Jenny became a full-time housewife. Son Paul was born in October 1967. In 1977 Jenny and Richard divorced. She is now married to businessman David Stait. Pitman is a survivor of thyroid cancer and a patron of the British Thyroid Foundation. ==Books==

• co-author Sue Gibson • • • • • • ==References==