Jack Callan will be crowned British flat champion apprentice at Ascot on Saturday, and he has done it the hard way. Since the championship started on 2 May, he has ridden 50 winners from 374 rides in Britain, a strike rate of 13.4%. That leaves him 11 clear of Ashley Lewis, with Jack Nicholls a further five back in third, and with the title race ending on Saturday, the job is done.
The son of Neil Callan, who rode for years in Hong Kong, he grew up around Sha Tin before the family moved back to Britain in 2021. “Literally, from as long as I can remember, I’ve been obsessed with it,” he said earlier this year. We have been through every one of his rides in Britain this season to find out where, and for whom, the winners have come.
Callan’s Happy Hunting Ground: Lingfield
Top tracks by number of winners
Lingfield has been the engine room of his title bid. He has ridden nine winners from 43 rides there, almost a fifth of his total, and he managed doubles at the Surrey track on 12 May, 6 June and 27 June. Wolverhampton is next with six winners from 37 rides, including a double on 16 June and another on 21 July.
Windsor has supplied four winners, three of them on one evening in May, while Leicester, Kempton and Bath have produced three apiece. In all, he has had a winner at 20 different tracks, from Hamilton and Ayr in Scotland down to Brighton on the south coast.
Top tracks by strike rate
Among the tracks where he has had at least ten rides, Leicester comes out on top. He won three of his ten rides there, including a double on 9 May when John Galt and 25/1 shot Union Island both obliged. Windsor (four from 17) is next at 24%, and Kempton (three from 14) and Lingfield both come in at 21%. That Kempton haul includes his biggest-priced winner of the season, 18/1 shot Nonrem for Brian Meehan in a fillies’ novice in September.
Butler the key ally
Top trainers by winners
Callan is attached to George Boughey, but it is John Butler who has done most for his title bid. The Newmarket trainer has supplied eight winners from just 22 rides, and he got the ball rolling when Rising Force won at Thirsk on the opening day of the championship. Senor Cortez has been the star of the partnership, winning three times at Southwell, Lingfield and Kempton, while Kaaranah and Split Elevens have both won twice.
Boughey is second with five winners, although they have come from 60 rides. In total, 30 different trainers have given him at least one winner, and that spread has been crucial for a rider without a big yard churning out short-priced favourites.
Top trainers by strike rate
Butler also tops the strike-rate table (minimum ten rides). Callan has won on 36% of his rides for the trainer, and 14 of the 22 have finished in the first three. Tom Clover is next at 30%, thanks largely to Quantum Power, who won twice on the July Course in the space of a fortnight.
George Baker (two from ten), Dylan Cunha (two from 12) and Ed Dunlop (three from 20) follow, with Dunlop’s trio including 20/1 shot Superposition on the Rowley Mile in May. Charlie Johnston rounds off the top six with three winners from 31 rides.
His winningest days
Callan’s best day came at Windsor on 23 May. Legacy Rock, Boughey’s Lady Dora Mae and Distant Rumble gave him a treble from seven rides, and it remains the only time he has ridden three winners in a day this season. He has added nine doubles, and 39 of his 122 days riding in Britain have produced at least one winner.
The most recent double came at Brighton on 28 September, when Wild Orchid and Hamda’s Joy both won at 7/1. “She was game. She came to me a bit earlier than I probably wanted to go, but she stuck to the task very well,” he said of Johnston’s filly. He has kept ticking over since, and Izzy Fast brought up his half-century at 11/1 at Yarmouth on Monday.
What happened to past champion apprentices?
History suggests the title is a good omen. Oisin Murphy, champion apprentice in 2014, has gone on to win five senior titles. Billy Loughnane, who took the apprentice crown in 2023, will be crowned champion jockey on the same afternoon as Callan, making it two senior champions from the 11 apprentice titles since 2014.
Most of the others have gone on to big things too, including Tom Marquand, whose career highlights feature two St Legers and the Champion Stakes, David Egan, who has won the Saudi Cup and Sheema Classic on Mishriff, and Cieren Fallon won the July Cup on Oxted. Jason Watson landed last year’s QEII on 100/1 shot Cicero’s Gift.
What next season may look like
The Boughey link remains Callan’s biggest asset, especially given how much they have helped impending champion Loughnane’s progress in 2026. The yard supplied Bow Echo to Loughnane this season, and Callan has already won on Westport, Lady Dora Mae, Roxa Love, Tryst and Asuka for his boss, the last of them in a Class 3 handicap at Thirsk in August.
The Butler partnership should also continue to bear fruit, while the 30 different trainers who have used him this season show how much the weighing room thinks of him. “I couldn’t have asked for it to go better so far,” he said in March. Seven months and 50 winners later, it has only gotten better.