LITMIR.BIZ

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at its peak shortly before dawn and brought down power lines and even large trees. I set off for work on my scooter more in hope than expectation. The wind was so strong that several times I was nearly lifted bodily from the saddle. Eventually, I battled my way through without mishap but a huge tree had come down onto Luca’s covered ride, and others had fallen in the yard and paddocks, so there was little we could do except feed and muck out the horses.

      As far as I am aware only one person in Newmarket slept through all the mayhem. That was my father who was over with Christine in his large camper van. They had come to dinner at Bernice’s house the night before and then returned to the van in a car park nearby. The wind was rocketing past his window, roofs were disappearing, slates were flying in all directions, rows of trees were falling over like skittles, and their van shook as if it was at sea in a force 9 gale—but Dad slept soundly through it all, before emerging later that morning to ask what all the fuss was about.

      As the season drew towards its close I expected to be heading home for another winter in Naples, but this time Luca put his foot down and insisted that I shouldn’t be allowed to fritter away my claiming allowance in Italy. He and my dad debated long and hard before coming up with a plan to send me to California, where I would continue my education as a work rider at Santa Anita racecourse under the guidance of Richard Cross, one of Luca’s first assistants. It was a decision that had a profound effect on my career.

      Santa Anita in December—against the stunning backdrop of the San Gabriel mountains—was a vast improvement on Newmarket but it was hardly a picnic. I stayed with Richard and his family that first year at their home in Pasadena, fifteen minutes from the racecourse. We started work at dawn and then rode up to ten horses each morning round the tight left-hand track.

      With the rest of the day to myself I’d play cards in the track kitchen before watching racing in the afternoons and having a few little bets to keep myself entertained. Luca had told Richard to be tough on me and keep me under control, but I managed to escape his watchful eye most of the time—though there is a limit to the damage you can inflict on $100 a week.

      This was the golden era of jockeys in California, with Bill Shoemaker, Chris McCarron, Eddie Delahoussaye, Angel Cordero, Fernando Toro, Laffit Pincay and the young star Gary Stevens in action most days. Shoemaker—who died in October 2003—was tiny but wonderfully effective, a legend who, by then at the age of 55, was as cute as an old fox and still difficult to beat in a finish. ‘The Shoe’, as he was knicknamed, retired three years later with a record of 8833 wins. Laffit Pincay eventually passed that total and had reached 9530 winners by the time he retired in 2003. Some day someone will overtake that record, but it is still an amazing total when you think I was still just short of 2,000 winners in England at the start of 2004.

      Angel Cordero quickly became my favourite jockey in America, perhaps because we are quite similar. He was a crowdpleasing showman whose trademark was to produce a flying dismount after his big race victories. It was stunning to watch. Soon, in the privacy of Richard Cross’s barn in a quiet corner of Santa Anita, I was indulging my fantasies by practising my own flying dismounts in front of a baffled audience of a few Mexican horsewalkers and grooms.

      Often my last task of the morning was to ride the tack horses, the ones that had just come back into training after injury or for some other reason were not ready for anything more strenuous than gentle exercise walking round and round Richard’s barn. Completing endless laps at such a slow pace for up to an hour was mind-numbing, so to keep myself awake I listened to tapes on my earphones and amused myself by trying to mimic the mannerisms and styles of the great riders of the day. Then I would invite Richard’s grooms to identify which jockey I was imitating.

      I managed a passable Shoe, and a decent Chris McCarron, but the impression I enjoyed the most was always my Cordero flying dismount. Not that I would have a chance to unveil it in public for another nine years. When the hour was finished I used to launch myself as high as I could like Angel. That’s how it started. I just copied him. The trick is to use the irons as a springboard. Angel was an inspiration and had a massive influence on me. He was so strong he could lift a horse in a finish. Most of all I loved his personality, perhaps because I am naturally outgoing, too. Years later I heard that one of his flying dismounts had gone spectacularly wrong. As he jumped off, one of his feet remained trapped in the irons with the result that he fell head first under the horse. Luckily only his pride was hurt.

      Somehow, probably without realising it, I was taking the best from each of these riders as I tried to improve my own style. The last thing I wanted was to stand out like Ned the Coachman among these great jockeys! So I worked hard to improve my riding and streamline my position in the saddle—though I wasn’t yet tempted to try the toe-in-the-iron style that is now the fashion on both sides of the Atlantic. That came a few years later.

      All American jockeys ride with their right leg a fair bit shorter in the stirrups than the left one. It is a method known as ‘acey-deucey’ and gives them better balance on their tracks which are all left-handed (anticlockwise). Naturally I tried this by altering the length of my irons in the mornings, though long before I visited California for the first time I was already in the habit of riding with the leathers on my right leg a hole shorter than on my left. I’ve just done it from day one. Don’t ask me why.

      There was a further bonus from my daily card sessions among our regular school in the track kitchen. It came from contact with a tiny little character who was one of the heroes of American racing. By the time I met Johnny Longden he was already in his eighties but he had a sparkle in his eyes to match the diamonds on the horseshoe rings he wore on his chubby fingers as he played cards each morning. He had short grey hair, wore glasses and remains the only man to have won the Kentucky Derby as a jockey and as a trainer.

      Johnny’s story was a fascinating one. He was born in Yorkshire but emigrated to Canada with his family at the age of five. Later he worked in coalmines in Alberta. He rode in unofficial bareback races before moving on to seek fame and fortune in America. He retired in 1966 with a record 6032 wins, but was still drawn to the racecourse each morning. I regret that we never talked much about riding. More than anything I wish I could go back and chat to him again now.

      I was lucky that I could play cards with people like Johnny, although they probably looked on me as another sucker to provide them with easy money. It was a strange time for me because there I was, just seventeen, living in a grown-up world which I found quite scary. One thing I did learn on that first visit to California was to ride against the clock until it became second nature. American horsemen rely heavily on the stopwatch to measure track work, and within a few months I could complete a gallop to order to within fractions of a second. It is a gift shared by every American jockey and explains why they are such brilliant judges of pace and so comfortable at making the running in races.

      The hardest part of the job that winter was gaining entry to Santa Anita racecourse. The Americans have always been pretty strict about issuing track permits for visiting riders, and for some reason all I had was a tourist visa. So each morning I had to smuggle myself into the racecourse, either behind the back seat of a car or hidden in the boot. It helped that there were two entrance gates to the stable area.

      On the occasions I was caught I usually managed to slip through unnoticed at the second gate. But eventually they became wise to me at both entrances, so then I had to slog all the way to another racecourse, Hollywood Park, which was at least a forty-five minutes drive from Santa Anita. That meant getting out of bed at the unearthly hour of 4 a.m! Without a track licence I was not insured to ride work at Santa Anita. In effect I was an illegal immigrant, but I enjoyed the challenge of trying to beat the system each morning. It made life more exciting.

       Eight Give the Kid a Chance

      My first task in the spring of 1988 was to find myself an agent to help book my rides. The obvious choice was Mattie Cowing who had shared so many entertaining days with me in Cuthie Suttle’s betting shop. Mattie was already handling Bruce Raymond’s rides, but he turned me down because he was not convinced that I took my job seriously enough. Next I turned to Simon Crisford, the Newmarket

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