I FEEL LIKE MY INSIDES HAVE BEEN TORN OUT
Legend Lysaght’s pain at being axed by BBC
I find goodbyes really hard in normal life. I cry pretty easily
The BBC’s voice of racing is in the final furlong of his career with the corporation and admits it will hurt when he crosses the finish line at the end of next month.
‘In some ways I feel the insides have been torn out of me,’ says Cornelius Lysaght as he prepares for the start of his last Cheltenham in the job.
The BBC’s management have decreed that, come Sandown late in April, there will be no more of his throaty, distinctive reportage that is imbued with a natural authority.
Clearly it is not just listeners — racing fans and agnostics alike — who will miss him. While we talk, two good luck messages ping in from BBC colleagues in other sports, one of them from Ian Dennis, the football commentator.
‘I’ve had a lot of text messages like that and it means a lot,’ says Lysaght, trying to be cheerfully resilient. ‘About five years ago I started a dinner with colleagues and called it, tongue-in-cheek, the Dinosaur Dinner. Little did I know that the dinosaur joke would come back and bite me in the a***.’
It is just after breakfast, and by this time Lysaght has already done two-way interviews with 12 local radio stations plus slots on Radios 4 and 5.
Such work rate and expertise has been deemed surplus to requirements by those at the Beeb with a preoccupation for reaching the elusive 18-34 age group. But Lysaght is not being directly replaced, which partly reflects the perception that racing’s place in the public consciousness has slipped.
Lysaght is going as part of what he describes as a ‘changing of the guard’ in the sports department. Others gone or fading away include Mark Pougatch, Jonathan Overend, Alan Green and Garry Richardson.
Unlike Green, Lysaght is not inclined to complain about his soon-to-be former employer. his love of working for the corporation is why he knows the next month will be difficult.
‘People have asked me if I wouldn’t want to finish at the Grand National, but it will be an emotional enough day for me already,’ he says. ‘I find goodbyes really hard in normal life. I cry pretty easily.
‘We have seen so many dramas at Aintree over the years, if there’s a big story with a lot of fall-out, I can’t say, “I’m not doing it because I’m leaving”, so it’s better to wait.
‘Whatever people’s views or my views of the BBC are, it is the outstanding broadcasting organisation in the world. I’ve worked really hard, been very loyal to the BBC. I have had masses out of them, but I also feel they have had masses out of me.
‘I was one of the bright young things 30 years ago when there were also changes. Some people who were around then were a bit disappointed. I’ve been working for 39 years overall, even though I’m only 55. People think I’m older because of my bald head, and because I’ve always been a bit of a young fogey.
‘It’s exceptionally sad for us and personally I think it’s sad for the BBC. There is nothing wrong with experience. I hope if it is good radio it doesn’t matter whether you are 20 or 90 years old.
‘In my case I think it’s very sad for the sport because I believe that I have been a standardbearer for horse racing. Not a cheerleader, because there’s a lot wrong with it, but I have made sure its story has been told.’
Judging by the way he crisscrosses the parade ring, everyone appears to be a contact or acquaintance. It is not a world that he will be leaving, although he does not yet have firm plans.
‘The jumps have been my passion, that’s how I got into the sport, through my father and my godfather. he gave me a big book of racing silks when I was a child and that was it. I grew up on hereford and Chepstow racecourses.
‘I love everything to do with jumps. The original steeplechase in Ireland ended in Doneraile, which is where my family is from originally.’
Certain people and animals have a place in his heart: ‘Adrian Maguire was a favourite, the best never to have been champion jockey. he always bounced back from injury, and he was a bit dangerous on a night out.
‘I loved Denman. There was this, “Who are you for, Denman or Kauto Star?” I admired Kauto, but I loved Denman. One of the times I’ve been tearful when working was when he came second at Cheltenham in 2009 after all he had been through.’
Lysaght does not shout nor drop his consonants, habits which the BBC hierarchy suppose may be appealing to the younger generation. Nor is he blind to racing’s shortcomings.
‘Cheltenham, Aintree and Ascot are bigger than ever. But some of the rest of the time it can be a struggle to get racing on air. Something I would like to address, going forward, is how to make it more relevant.’