champions.

​What National Hunts get rights and the Flat does not, is how to end a season.
On Saturday, Brian Hughes was crowned champion jockey. He deserved, though would not have wanted, a long and spirited reception, though the respect of his peers was no doubt all that he wished-for. A.P. picked up the trophy on behalf of J.P. McManus as leading owner, the great man achieving the same distinction in Ireland. Paul Nicholls was again champion trainer and Luca Morgan received the trophy for leading conditional. All deserving winners, of course.
As someone who champions the lesser to the extent as I praise the stars of the sport, I would like the leading amateur rider to receive his or her trophy at Sandown. Also, flying in the face of gender equality, and on a day when two of the big prizes went to female jockeys, why not continue to highlight the burgeoning presence of female jockeys on the big-race stage by handing out a trophy to the leading female professional jockey. I’m not sure if Bryony managed to snatch the prize from Emma Smith-Chaston but if she failed to be leading female again this season, it would demonstrate to the public that other female jockeys are on the rise in the sport and that Rachel and Bryony are not rare exceptions.

Those crowned champions in different categories do not always go on to achieve great things in the sport, of course. Sometimes injuries bring careers to a halt. Sometimes it is weight, sometimes someone’s face no longer fits the needs of employers.
My eyes fell on a page in a book the other day listing the champion apprentices since 1982 and there were names I either couldn’t remember or thought ‘where are they now’. In 1994 Stephen Davies was champion. What became of him? In 1998 Carl Lowther. In 2005 Salem Golan dead-heated with Hayley Turner. We all know about Hayley but where does Salem now ply his trade? In 2007 Greg Fairley was champion. Again, what was his fate? In 2012 a name that puzzles me as I should know of him. A Ryan. And, I suppose, we all need reminding that in 2016 Josie Gordon was champion apprentice with 50-winners. Why does her face not fit these days?
In the same book was a list of the ten top-rated two-year-olds of the previous season, of which only Roaring Lion come close to being a superstar. Sands of Mali won, I believe, at Royal Ascot the following season, Saxon Warrior and Sioux Nation are successful sires, Expert Eye won Group races, while, in my eyes, U.S. Navy Flag, Verbal Dexterity, Fleet Review, Mendelsshon and Unfortunately fell off the radar. Or my radar, at least.
To finish this brief wander down flat racing’s rocky road, the highest-priced yearling at Tattersalls Sales was a yearling colt by Galileo that was bought for 4-million guineas by Godolphin and was named Gloam.
A yearling to be named King Power made 2-million and a half-guineas. All our Tomorrows 1.70-million Guineas. Faylaq 1.5-million guineas. And so on and so on. Bangkok, by the way, cost only 500,000 guineas.
The money thrown to the wind at horse sales beggars belief.
Finally, on how to end a season. It’s not the way the flat presently concludes. Champion jockeys that have not necessarily won the most races during the turf season leave a sour taste, or they do to me. Although the racing cannot be criticised, ‘Champions Day’ is humbug. Doncaster on November Handicap Day is where the trophies should be handed-over. That is the natural way to end a season, at the end. Not a month before, trivialising every race before the Guineas meeting and ever race after ‘Champions Day’.