Ing. Samuel Sokol celebrated his 60th birthday

In the past few days, former successful horse racing driver and trainer Ing. Samuel Sokol celebrated his life anniversary. He currently works at the Topoľčianky National Stud in the position of "head of horse breeding and trainer of racehorses". As it happens, his path to the National Stud was not straightforward, so we were curious as to what preceded it.

He was born in Holíč na Záhorí, where at that time there were two horse racing stables. Here he spent his entire childhood and teenage period in the Družba Holíč riding club, where in 1973 he began actively riding with the experienced trainer Otto Suchovský. Here a strong horse racing group was formed and many of these people, e.g. Ľudovít Šebesta or Stanislav Matulík are active in horse racing to this day. After finishing elementary school, he completed his studies at the grammar school in Skalica. Even then, he knew that his life without horses would certainly be empty and unfulfilled, so he decided to supplement his education professionally and applied to the Secondary Agricultural School in Levice. His desire to become a racehorse trainer required a special qualification from SOUP in Šala. He did not hesitate and graduated from this school, too. Well, who among us can boast of three secondary schools... However, his journey to expertise does not end here, because Samuel Sokol also successfully completed his studies at the Slovak Agricultural University in Nitra.
Everything in his life seems to have been done with the goal of using it to work with horses. In the period before graduating from university, he made a living as a truck driver for several months. He later used the acquired experience and skills to transport horses. From 1981 to 1989, he worked at Koopera SPPŽV in Levice. At that time in one of the most successful agricultural enterprises of animal production. He held the position of zootechnician for horse breeding. Then his path led to JRD Veľký Grob, where his lifelong dream began to come true. He finally became a racehorse trainer. This period marked a big change in his life. He had to move to Bratislava. The JRD Veľký Grob horse racing stable was located at STU Slávia in Bratislava at that time. Unfortunately, right after the first season, JRD split up. They lost interest in breeding and training racehorses. This was the moment when Ing. Sokol moved to the then Topoľčianky Breeding Company as a trainer of racehorses and head of the horse breeding. However, to make it not so easy, in 1996 he interrupted his work there and returned back to Bratislava. Here he engaged in a private coaching practice until 2011, when his path led again to the National Stud, where he is working up to presence.