Jockey Tommie Jakes ‘in unhealthy place’ and ‘struggled’ earlier than his tragic dying at 19
One of Tommie Jakes’ weighing room colleagues has paid tribute to the jockey who was found dead at his home near Newmarket on Thursday at the age of 19, just hours after his final ride at Nottingham Racecourse
Tommie Jakes has been remembered as a “lovely, polite young lad” who was “obviously in a bad place”, by his weighing room colleagues.
The 19-year-old apprentice jockey, who claimed 59 victories in three seasons on the Flat, was tragically found dead at his home near Newmarket on Thursday, just hours after his last race at Nottingham Racecourse.
Suffolk Police released a statement saying: “Police were called by the ambulance service at 5.45am this morning to reports of the sudden death of a man in Freckenham. The death is not being treated as suspicious and a file will now be prepared for the coroner.”
Jakes’ passing has prompted an outpouring of tributes, with racecourses observing a minute’s silence and jockeys donning black armbands in his memory.
Speaking to RacingTV at Newmarket on Saturday, Hector Crouch shared his thoughts on Jakes and the impact of his untimely death. He said: “I knew him as a colleague. I wouldn’t have been in his circle of friends. He was one of the younger members of the weighing room. – always quite loud and quite mischievous. That would be a good way of summing him up from what I’ve seen.
“He was a lovely, polite young lad. He loved his racing. He worked very hard. He was a tall lad and struggled with his weight like a lot of us. He was a bright young lad with a real promising future.”
He went on to say: “It’s a real sad time for everyone. The weighing room is a real community and everyone’s really feeling it. Thursday was a bit of disbelief for most of the day. It only sort of hit me late Thursday night when I was going round Chelmsford and horses he was down to ride were going round. Then it was really starting to sink in.
“He was obviously in a bad place and, thankfully for him, whatever suffering he was going through isn’t there anymore. I wish the best for his family and friends that knew him best.”
Crouch suggested that the closure of saunas during the Covid pandemic, which have not been reopened, has cost the weighing rooms some of their communal atmosphere.
He added: “A big thing I find that’s missing from the weighing room nowadays from when I first started, the community aspect is a little more fractured with the way racing operates now with the lack of saunas.
“Everyone is pursuing the sport individually. That was the real heart of the weighing room where lads of all ages were there talking through their issues.
“You could be locked in a room with someone for 40 minutes who you didn’t know and come out knowing a little bit more about them. It just brings the whole place together a little bit more.
“People don’t tend to do that when you are sat across the room from someone, but when you are going through a little bit of hardship people reach out a little bit. It just makes you feel like that there is someone going through a similar plight to you and sometimes that can be enough.”
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