Dick Francis's Front Runner

7

On Tuesday morning I caught the 9.30 train from King’s Cross to Newark and then took a taxi to Southwell racecourse, arriving there just before eleven o’clock.

The first race was not until a quarter past midday but I wanted to speak to a couple of the trainers before they became too busy dealing with their horses.

One of them was Jason Butcher who also trained Garrick Party, the renowned front runner that had finished third at Haydock. According to the Racing Post, Jason had runners in both the first and third races, so I hung around outside the weighing room waiting for him to arrive.

All the talk was still about Dave Swinton. He had been due to ride at Southwell that afternoon and people were still saying that they couldn’t believe he was gone, and much of the talk reflected sympathy for him.

‘Poor man, fancy being driven to do that,’ I heard one man say.

‘I reckon it was his continuous dieting that was to blame,’ said his companion. ‘Lack of food probably affected his brain. Just like with Fred Archer.’

‘That was over a hundred years ago,’ replied the first man. ‘You do talk such bloody nonsense.’

‘You mark my words — it was starving himself all the time that was responsible.’

He may have had a point. I’d seen first hand what a struggle it had been. And it hadn’t just been the lack of food. Dave Swinton had lived in a permanent state of dehydration. Had that disturbed the balance of his mind?

My thoughts were interrupted by the arrival of Jason Butcher, who came bounding towards the weighing room to declare his runner in the first.

‘Jason Butcher?’ I said to him as he went to go past me.

He stopped. ‘Who wants to know?’

‘My name is Jeff Hinkley. I work for the BHA.’

I held out my credentials and he looked at them.

‘I’ve heard of you,’ he said. ‘Weren’t you involved in all that extortion business at the BHA a couple of years ago?’

I nodded, slightly taken aback that he knew about it.

‘What do you want of me?’ he asked.

‘Just a short word. I’ll wait while you go and make your declaration.’

He didn’t look especially happy and I didn’t really blame him. Just like the gateman at Newbury, no one likes someone in authority, especially someone in authority asking them questions.

I waited outside until he reappeared.

‘Now, what’s all this about?’ he asked with just a slight nervous timbre to his voice.

‘It’s about Garrick Party,’ I said. ‘Specifically, it’s about the race at Haydock the Saturday before last in which Garrick Party finished third.’

If he was unduly worried, he didn’t show it.

‘What about it?’

‘I understand you were interviewed by the stewards and asked about the running of the horse.’

‘Bloody ridiculous,’ he said.

‘What was?’

‘Dave bloody Swinton.’ He lowered his voice. ‘Perhaps one shouldn’t speak badly about him at the moment, but he was right out of order.’

‘In what way?’

‘He should have been aware that old Garrick likes to make the running and has a finish only as fast as my grandmother on her Zimmer frame but, oh no, he suddenly thinks at Haydock he knows better. Holds the old boy up for a run from the second last. I ask you. The man’s a bloody idiot.’

‘Did you actually tell him how to ride the horse?’ I asked.

He raised his eyebrows towards his hairline and lowered his voice even more. ‘You never tell Dave Swinton anything. If you are lucky enough for him to condescend to ride your horses, you have to sit back and watch them run as he thinks fit. He reckons he knows best, and mostly he does. But not with old Garrick, that’s for sure — even though he’d ridden him several times before as a front runner, and won.’

‘Did he say anything to you afterwards?’

‘He made some absurd excuse about thinking the horse would run better in heavy going if he was held up. It was all utter garbage but the stewards seemed to accept it. Maybe he believed it himself but, I’ll tell you now, he won’t be riding old Garrick next time out.’ He stopped and blushed slightly as he realized what he’d just said. ‘No, I suppose he won’t anyway.’

‘What did the owner say?’

‘Silly old fool. It was his idea to ask Swinton to ride the horse in the first place. Thought it gave him some sort of kudos to have the champion jockey riding his horse. Stupid nonsense. And it’s not the first time I blame Swinton for not winning on one of my horses.’

‘Explain,’ I said.

‘About three weeks ago he rode a novice hurdler for me at Doncaster, horse called Perambulator. In my opinion, Swinton got the tactics all wrong and left it far too late at the end to make his run. Beaten by a head, we were, but Pram was the fastest finisher by a streak. He’d have won if the post had been just a couple of yards farther away. He should have won that race, easy.’ There was real bitterness in his voice and I wondered how much he had gambled, and lost.

‘But things like that happen in racing all the time,’ I said.

‘Well, they shouldn’t. Not when you’ve paid the extra to have the maestro riding for you.’ His tone was sarcastic and clearly reflected what had been said to him, probably by Dave Swinton himself.

‘Extra?’ I asked.

‘Yeah. The extra cash he demands to ride one of your horses.’

‘How much extra?’ I asked.

‘A jump jockey’s fee is just over a hundred and sixty pounds for each ride. But if you want D. Swinton in the saddle it’d cost you the same again in readies. He even has the nerve to call it a present — Let’s just call it a gift, shall we? he’d say.’

I wondered if those were the ‘gifts’ Dave had been referring to when he’d been talking about his taxes.

‘And I’ll tell you another thing,’ Jason Butcher said, looking around him to check that no one else was listening, ‘racing will be much better off without him.’

Unlike nearly everyone else, Jason Butcher was obviously not a fan of the deceased champion jockey, if indeed it had been Dave Swinton dead in the burning Mercedes.

I watched from the grandstand as Jason Butcher’s horse just failed to win the first race, beaten in the mud by a fast-finishing animal carrying fifteen pounds less weight.

The trainer clearly wasn’t happy. He stood in the space reserved for the second, bunching his fists and looking daggers towards the jockey. He was someone who undoubtedly always blamed the pilot rather than the machine. Not that he was alone. Many punters are convinced that it is the horse’s doing when it wins, but the jockey’s fault when it loses.

I went in search of another trainer, Thomas Cheek, who trained Chiltern Line, the horse that had failed to win under Dave Swinton at Ludlow due to being boxed-in on the rails. He had a runner later in the day, in the feature race.

I found him sitting with an elderly couple at a table in the owners and trainers’ bar.

‘Thomas Cheek?’ I asked.

‘Tom,’ he said.

‘My name is Jeff Hinkley. I work for the BHA.’ I showed him my credentials. ‘I’d like to ask you a few questions.’

He read the word ‘investigator’ printed on the card and, as was always the case with everyone, he wasn’t too happy.

‘What about?’

I looked at his two companions.

‘It’s all right,’ he said. ‘I’ve nothing to hide from Mr and Mrs Valdemon. They own Peach of a Day that runs in the fourth.’

‘I want to ask you about the running of Chiltern Line in a handicap chase at Ludlow on November nineteenth.’

‘What about it?’ he asked. ‘He finished second behind Taximan.’

I nodded. ‘I watched the race video. Were you happy with the result?’

‘I’d have preferred it if he’d won, obviously, but he ran above his rating so I can’t complain.’

‘Were you happy about the way it was ridden?’

‘I suppose so. Dave Swinton rode it.’ He opened his hands, palms uppermost, as if to say how could he possibly complain about the late champion jockey.

‘But the horse was badly boxed-in coming round the final bend and had to drop back before making his run.’

‘I know,’ he said, ‘but I’d told Dave Swinton that Chiltern Line liked to run close to the rail. Always does so at home, so it may have been my fault he was in that position.’

I wasn’t completely convinced but there seemed to be nothing further to say on the matter.

‘Well, that’s all,’ I said. ‘Thank you for your time.’

‘No problem,’ Tom said, and Mr and Mrs Valdemon smiled.

I began to turn away but then turned back to face him. ‘Just one last thing. Did Dave Swinton ever ask you for an extra gift to ride your horses?’

He blushed.

‘In what way?’ he asked, but he knew exactly in what way I was talking about.

‘As an extra riding fee?’

‘Why would he do that?’

‘Look,’ I said. ‘I know he asked others. I just want to know if he asked you. It’s not against the Rules of Racing.’ At least, I didn’t think so, even though any unregistered payments in cash were always frowned upon and maybe they did break one or other of the myriad of obscure BHA regulations.

‘He called me and said he’d ride my horses but he wanted an extra hundred and fifty pounds each time to ride them. I said I wouldn’t pay that — I couldn’t afford it — so I told him I’d get someone else to ride them. But then he said he’d do it for just a hundred and an additional cut of any prize money.’

‘How big an additional cut?’ I asked.

‘As much again as the rules state, paid in cash to him as a gift. I had to get my owners to agree as they had to pay it.’

Mr and Mrs Valdemon nodded at me in unison.

‘We thought it was worth it to get his services,’ said Mrs Valdemon in a soft Black Country accent. ‘He won two races for us before.’ She squeezed her husband’s hand. ‘And he should have been riding Peach of a Day for us this afternoon. It is such a dreadful thing to have happened to him, isn’t it?’

‘Indeed it is,’ I agreed.

I left the three of them to their drinks and went outside to watch the second race from the grandstand — a not very exciting-looking two-and-a-half-mile novice hurdle race for conditional jockeys.

Inexperienced riders on inexperienced horses — not surprisingly, it was a recipe for disaster.

Southwell racecourse is a flat oval with two long straights joined by sharp semi-circular bends. It is just over a mile round, which means that, in a two-and-a-half-mile race, the horses have to complete two-and-a-bit full circuits. Hence the start was between the second last and final hurdles.

The seven runners jumped off fairly well and, as is always the way in novice hurdle races, they clattered their way noisily over the first obstacle.

As they passed in front of the grandstand for the first time, one of them tried to dive back down the chute towards the parade ring and the stables. The poor fresh-faced jockey was caught completely unawares and was unceremoniously dumped onto the turf in full view of the meagre crowd, much to the enjoyment of most.

The remaining six continued on their way round the sharp turn and down the back straight, negotiating the hurdles with little drama.

That was reserved for later.

Two of the young jockeys obviously couldn’t count up to three and rode out a finish between them when there was still a whole circuit of the course to complete. Their embarrassment was compounded when they both pulled up and put their arms around each other as if they had just finished the Grand National.

That left four who made heavy weather of the final mile, one horse falling in the back straight and another unseating its rider at the second last hurdle. So, just two of the seven lasted the course to contest a finish, but at least they did manage to provide some decent entertainment for those in the stands.

In a flurry of hands, heels, elbows and knees, they were finally separated only by a photograph and, in truth, despite their less than stylish techniques, neither of them deserved to lose. The two jockeys received a good hand as their mounts were led back to the unsaddling enclosure, which is more than could be said for the others, who sneaked back to the changing room in disgrace.

I stayed to watch Peach of a Day run second in the day’s feature steeplechase.

He ran well enough but the replacement jockey had kept him slightly off the pace for too long and the horse had been just unable to make up the deficit in the run to the line from the last fence.

Mr and Mrs Valdemon appeared rather disappointed as they listened to the excuses.

Maybe they felt that paying Dave Swinton his extra ‘gift’ in cash would have been worth it to get the win, if only he had been alive to receive it.

Were they wrong?

Not one bit.

Racing was all about the winning.

There were no plaudits for coming second.