The day Lester Piggott took America by storm
They never come back. Four stark words that have often served as the epitaph for the careers of great sportsmen who, having left the arena, find that life after sport is unsustainable.
They return in an often desperate, even pitiful, attempt to regain past glories. Lester Piggott took no heed of such rules; he took precious little notice of the regulations set down by either the Jockey Club or Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs for that matter.
“Old Stoneface” lived by his own creed and set a style that broke the mould. He knew his worth and was worldly enough to make sure that he was remunerated for it accordingly. The formbook may have constituted his daily reading, but the financial pages were probably a short-head second.
Any assessment of the relative merits of jockeys can be argued to be irrevocably flawed because their achievements rely heavily upon another’s capabilities. “Good horses make good jockeys” is the old adage, however this dictum does not take into account those whose flair can lift a good horse to the pantheon reserved for champions. The last hundred years have been illuminated by many jockeys but the name of Piggott stands as the brightest of beacons and did so in a career that spanned six decades.
The essence of Piggott’s immense talent was an alloy of three priceless elements of balance, strength and tactical awareness to the point that he knew how the other horses in a race were travelling better than many of the jockeys who were riding them.
Piggott attracted plaudits and criticism in almost equal measure, whether it was for his bespoke riding style, the lengths he would go to in order to secure the best rides in the biggest races – often at the expense of another rider - or his aloof nature to outsiders.
The purists, as they would often like to regard themselves, condemned his ultra-short riding style, which was as revolutionary as Todd Sloan’s at the beginning of the 20th Century. This was because they believed it set a bad example to apprentices who, often haplessly, tried to emulate him. Perched over a horse, with his bottom thrust high in the air, it was easy to pick him out in the hurly burly of the biggest fields. When he was asked why his derriere pointed heavenwards he said dryly: “Well, I’ve got to put it somewhere.”
Where he put himself 20 years ago was back in the spotlight. Five years after his retirement from riding and days away from his 55th birthday, Piggott returned to the saddle and within a fortnight rode Royal Academy to win http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymmTcCW31JE&feature=related for the man who had persuaded him out of his retreat, Vincent O’Brien.
Having made a tentative return in a couple of veterans’ races during the summer, O’Brien suggested that Piggott still had unfinished business. Piggott’s return at a mundane mid-week meeting at Leicester in mid-October made national headlines and he rode a winner in a minor race at Chepstow on his second day back in the saddle, but 11 days later he was riding at Belmont Park on the richest days’ racing in the world.
John Reid, O’Brien’s stable jockey, was out injured, and Piggott stepped back into the spotlight like a favourite jacket. “Royal Academy was originally going to run at Newmarket, which was the week before,” Piggott once recalled. “Somebody else had been booked to ride him and then Vincent changed his mind. The horse was going so well at home that he decided to take him to America.”
For once the jockey who had talked his way on to some of the best horses around waited to be asked. “In the week before the Breeders’ Cup, Vincent asked me to come over and ride four horses at the Curragh, and all his horses won. Royal Academy had four owners and they were all pulling in different ways about a jockey and eventually Vincent said ‘you ride the horse’.
“I went over about two days before the race and I rode him in the morning the day before the race. It was the first time I’d ever sat on him and he was a lot like Nijinsky [his sire on whom Piggott won the 1970 Derby]. He was a big horse and he used to get on his toes a bit.
“When the stalls opened he was a little bit slow away which he had been most of his life, and he was behind which wasn’t a bad thing really. At halfway I was able to pick them up and get into a good position.
“Just before we straightened up I was going terribly well but then something happened to the horse. He put his foot in a hole or whatever but he lost all his momentum, like he’d been shot.”
The American media had rarely warmed to the often taciturn jockey and were probably ready to load the gun themselves but actions speak louder than words and Piggott was about to deliver 30 seconds of pure eloquence. A gruelling first four furlongs was setting the race up for a late closer. Piggott had Royal Academy in sixth place coming in the home straight and was ready to close the deal. Itsallgreektome had just taken the lead from Expensive Decision but the eye was already being drawn to further back in the field.
Piggott, left hand on the reins and right hand about to deliver the rallying call to Royal Academy through his whip, was launching an irresistible challenge which Tom Durkin spotted with “and Royal Academy is thundering down the middle down the centre of the turf course.”
“It took him another 50 yards to pick up again,” Piggott said. “I had to really ride him hard but he responded and it was unbelievable really.” Within 15 strides America’s finest had been struck by the bolt of lightning that was a Piggott driving finish.
“Old Stoneface” was back.
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