Rae Guest has announced that he is to cease training in January after 36 years with a licence. The Newmarket trainer told David Milnes of the Racing Post that he has sold his Chestnut Tree Stables to Jack Jones, who has rented some boxes there since he started training in 2022.
Now 74, Guest, who is also a former jockey with notable success in Scandinavia, India and Britain, is renowned as a trainer of fillies in particular. He notched his first Group 1 win in the Yorkshire Oaks with My Emma (GB) (Marju {Ire}), who later followed up in the Prix Vermeille. He also trained the Cheveley Park Stakes winner Serious Attitude (Ire) (Mtoto {GB}), while his latest black-type success came with Divina Grace (GB) (Golden Horn {GB}), winner of the Listed Chalice Stakes at Newmarket in August.
A widely popular member of the Newmarket training fraternity, Guest hails from a famous racing dynasty. His father Charlie Guest was a jockey, as was his uncle, Joe, while another uncle, Nelson, trained. Rae's brother Richard is a Grand National and Champion Hurdle-winning jockey and former trainer, sister Jane was married to Sir Henry Cecil and later trained successfully in her own right, and another of his sisters, Sally, was a leading amateur rider on the Flat and one of Sir Michael Stoute's key work riders.
Guest told Milnes, “I'm not giving up training because I don't enjoy it any more – I still love the game and some of my owners will have horses with Jack. I'll be following them and [wife] Rachel has a few mares, so I'll still be in the sport but just not the day-to-day training.”
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