Three-time champion jockey Oisin Murphy admitted he drank so heavily he regularly had blackouts before addressing his issues with alcohol.
The 26-year-old is currently serving a 14-month ban from riding after two alcohol breaches as well as breaking Covid protocols. Murphy, who was also fined £30,000, cannot return to the saddle until February next year.
And having received treatment for his drinking, he told the BBC: “When I was happy, I would drink, when I was sad I would drink.
“I put a lot of pressure on myself to achieve results but I dealt with that pressure entirely the wrong way. I might last a week or sometimes a month but it would spiral out of control again.
“But the time Goodwood came around in August [last year], I had blacked out every night of that week. Ok, I was probably blacking out very early in the evening so I was fine the next morning but I really couldn’t deal with the pressure and, by the Breeders’ Cup I was ready to stop riding.”
Murphy had faced five charges in all from the British Horseracing Authority. Two related to failed breathalyser tests in May and October last year.
He was also found guilty of lying to the BHA over a holiday in September 2020. He had claimed he had gone to Lake Como, which was then not on the British Government’s red list, rather than the Greek island of Mykonos, where he had actually been and which required a quarantine stint on his return.
“I had finally realised that my career was over unless I sorted myself out and also the embarrassment I brought not only on myself but the people closest to me,” he said.
“I made a massive mistake and I am suffering the consequences of that now. I can’t really portray how I felt throughout the last year. There were a lot of low days – most days were low in fact. I’m fully sober now and I want to maintain how I am. That is day by day.”
