THE RECORD-BREAKER

Evening Post, Volume CXVI, Issue 145, 16 December 1933, Page 5

THE RECORD-BREAKER

MODEST GORDON RICHARDS

MESSAGE FROM THE KING

(From "The Post's" Representative.) LONDON, November 9. The idol of the public just now is Gordon Richards. Even non-Turf enthusiasts are keen about the little man -who has clone so well and who is so modest about his great record. Indeed, he would greatly prefer to be less in the limelight, and he hopes that now he has achieved the great feat of eclipsing the record that the famous Fred Archer put up forty-eight years ago he will be allowed to get on with his job without so much ink being used up ou his account. In 1885 Fred Archer rode 246 winners. This year Gordon Richards lias ridden 247, and has still sixteen days before him in which to add to his great total. Archer's record was equalled by Richards at Hurst Park last Saturday, anil was surpassed yesterday at Aintree when he rode Mr. F. Hartigan's Golden King to decisive victory. Excitement on the course ran high. In the unsaddling enclosure it was tremendous. Indeed, one of the regular course-, goers says that he had never seen more enthusiasm displayed over a Grand National winner than over Richards on Golden King. Riding this record-breaking winner had, it seems, been no "cakewalk" for him. He had had to display all his wonderful powers of drive, with perfect rhythm, to maintain the lead once he had got his mount in front. Certainly his brother jockeys, at any rate those on Wild Blossom and Atherton, as also on Mellin, were not trying to make it easy for him. Richards had been in the dressing-room only a few minutes, still receiving the congratulations of his brother jockeys, when a telegram from Colonel Sir Clive Wigram, private secretary to the King, was handed to him. It read: "I am commanded to express to you his Majesty's hearty congratulations on winning 247 races, and by this splendid achievement establishing a record in the annals of racing in this country." The little rider's face lit up with joy as he read it. "Isn't that marvellous?" he said, and there was a thrill in his voice. "Tell her tha,t, too; she will be so proud"—this was to be embodied in a wire to his wife announcing his success. IN ARCHER'S DAY. "Hotspur" ("Daily Telegraph") remarks: "I have heard it said that far too much fuss has been made of the achievement. There have, of course, been hysterical excesses which have terribly - ; worried the jockey, but, looked at from the angle ol history-making,. then it is amazing that after all these years one rider should suddenly jump to the creation of new. figures which look like standing for all time. "One has only to look at the next best figures. Second to Richards is W. Nevett, witli a total of 70, so that the champion has ridden nearly four, times as mainy winners. In Fred Archer's day there-were jockeys like Charles Wood and. Fordham who rode well over a hundred winners a season. The old champion, therefore, was up against formidable competition. 'What he was not up against was the competition that prevails today to win races of any sort, because of the greater number ot horses in training and the much higher average of fields. Well, the crisis is over, and now until the end of the season at Manchester Gordon can go serenely on his way, by which time he will probably have established a Jeeord total of 260 winners, possibly more." ! , '■ ' "I dare say you are glad it is all over,^ a friend remarked. "You are quite right,' Richards said, "I was never so glad to get something finished. Thank goodness I can relax a bit now. Sausages and mashed potatoes tonight, and a good feed to celebrate it." ' By a strange coincidence the day was the anniversary of Archer's tragic death 47 years ago. Two of Fred Archer s nephews, Fred Pratt and Charles Pratt, are the owner and trainer respectively ot Solatium, the winner of the flat race that followed Richards's success on Golden King. RICHARDS ON THE AIR. Richards gave a broadcast talk in the national programme from Liverpool at night. He said he could hardly express his feelings when he won his 247 th race. Comparisons had been made by the Press between Archer and himself. Personally, he was sure that, "although conditions had changed, Archer would today have held his own with the best of them. He expressed his thanks to the owners, trainers, and to his brother jockeys for the good feeling they had shown him throughout the season, and said that he wished also to thank the public for the kind encouragement they had given him. The other day j at Worcester he was riding in five races. He won the first four, but the greatest reception was given him by the public when he was beaten on the favourite in the last race. After this he returned to his room, and remained there with Steve D.onoghue and one'or two friends. Congratulatory messages poured'in, and admirers clustered in the hotel, hoping to catch a glimpse of him. But he was not to be persuaded out of his room —even though there was a special' gala ball in his honour in the hotel. Since he started race-riding, in 1021, Richards has won 1401 races, his.previous highest total in one season being 190, last year. This is; the seventh year in which he has been at the top of the list of winning jockeys. PRESENT TO "HOTSPUR." Richards-lias presented to Captain E. Gaultry. ("Hotspur," of the "Daily Telegraph") the whip which he carried on Golden King. This whip he has had for six years, except for an interval of about two years during which it was lost. He thinks this happened during a meeting at AVolverhampton. However, it was restored to him, and "Hotspur" has thS" satisfaction of knowing that this unique trophy was not only carried by him when the new record was created, but that he has carried it all through the season of 1933. The racing expert of "The Times" pays tribute thus:— "TLere is nothing further that I can write about the abilities and qualities of this fine rider. He deserves all the successes that have come his way, and lrehas had nothing but a good effect on raceriding and racing generally. How he does what he does I do not pretend to know, for he breaks many of the accepted canons of race-riding^ His balance is perfect, and he seems able to impart to his mounts in some way or another the determination to win that he himself possesses. Even horses that have no real desire to race, like Golden King, have to race to- the bitier end. And there is ho cruelty in anything that he does. He seems sometimes to be hitting a horse hard, but when that horse comes baok to be unsaddled it 3s a very rare, thing for any marks of the whip to be found on him. "Apart from his riding there has never been a more modest breaker of a.record. It has been my privilege, and pleasure to have known, Richards for many years, and I know full well how he has hated all the recent publicity that has surrounded him. He hopes now nothing more than that he can be left to get on with his work quietly, and in his own unassuming manner. "Records are records, and personally having never broken one I think that they are things to be avoided. Archer was before my time, but yet he was in a way the first jockey that ever I knew anything of, for in the hall of my father's house was an oil painting of Fred Archer, so that every time I went out by the front door, or came in by it, I saw this great rider. He was as different as possible in figure and style from the man who has now ridden more races in a season than he. ever did. The conditions were different, so tliKt it may be that Archer had the greater trouble. But that does not matter in the least. Hobbs has made more centuries than ever W. G. Grace did, but that does not prove that Hobbs is a grenter cricketer than Grace was. It only | suggests that each was a greal; master of his art. : ' "Archer and Richards are great masters. Neither would claim to be greater than the other. And in all this let us remember other great riders. Donoghue, still riding as well and as artistically as ever. Carslake, Beary, the Wraggs, Danny Maher, of a past decade, Frank Wootton. The? were, or are, all great riders. Some, of them live >at the same time as Richards."