In a career spanning 37 years, Ron Hutchinson excelled in Australia, Europe and Asia.
As a 17 year-old apprentice, Hutchinson rode his first big win in the 1945 Australian Cup. It was the first of the 60 Cup winners he was to ride in Australia.
In his first full year as a senior jockey in 1949-50, he rode the top stayer, Hoyle, to win the Coongy Handicap and the Moonee Valley Cup in the spring, and won his second Australian Cup in the Autumn. For the next ten years he ranked among Australia's leading riders, and in 1958-59 he took out the Melbourne jockeys' premiership. Among his many successes were wins in the Newmarket Handicap, Futurity Stakes, the Metropolitan Handicap, VRC Oaks and Doomben Cup.
In 1960 Hutchinson decided to try his luck in Europe and was soon offered a retainer by the Duke of Norfolk, for whom he was stable jockey for 16 years. He won more than a thousand races in Europe, including the Ascot Gold Cup, the Goodwood Cup, the St Leger, the One Thousand Guineas, the Two Thousand Guineas, three Irish One Thousand Guineas, and an Irish Two Thousand Guineas.
Hutchinson was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2005.
Hutchinson concluded a brilliant career with a year in Malaysia and Singapore, where he won the 1978 jockeys' premiership.
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