Friends and colleagues from the home of horse racing at Newmarket are organising an event in memory of a former stable girl who lost her battle with cancer.
The team from The Jockey Club at Newmarket Racecourse has named the final horse race that takes place on Saturday, August 13, in memory of Jayne Reid, who died 10 years ago.
The race is organised by Jayne’s close friend, Cheryl Marshall, to remember the life of “a very upbeat person with a sparky personality” who died aged 27 at St Nicholas Hospice in Bury St Edmunds in 2012.
Ms Marshall said: “As this year marked 10 years since Jayne passed away, I said - let’s do something in her memory.
“Jayne was the life and soul of the party, and she always had a smile on her face. To lose her at 27 years old was just awful.
“She was just brilliant and was up for doing everything. She loved her horses and she loved riding.”
When Ms Reid worked at Pegasus Stables, she trained the now-retired Hallelujah, who claimed listed honours just under a year after the woman passed away.
Ms Reid’s former employer, a group-one winning trainer, James Fanshawe, called her “a really valued member of staff”.
He added: “Jayne was great with her horses. She worked late into her cancer, and she really did fight it hard. It was sad that she died so young.”
During the race, five runners will go to post for the Jayne Reid Memorial Fillies’ Handicap Stakes, headed by the Roger and Harry Charlton-trained Ashky, who will be bidding to complete a course and distance hat-trick in the mile prize.
It will be the second race in the memory of Ms Reid, who also has a tree planted in her name on the top of Warren Hill.
Her friends organised the Jayne Reid Smiles On Memorial Handicap on the Rowley Mile, two months after the stable girl passed away.
The friends of Ms Reid sponsored the race and also organised fundraising for St Nicholas Hospice because the people there "cared for her so well”.
Mr Reid's friends said: “The hospice cared for Jayne towards the end, and their care and attention has always stuck with her friends and family.
“We are blessed to have such a remarkable place with such a caring and dignified staff.”
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