JOHN AND ANN CARRICK

Fishmongers and grocers

John Carrick and his wife, Ann, run the family fish, fruit and veg business in North Yorkshire. The firm has become famous for fish stalls in local market towns, from Bedale to Barnard Castle, as well as a delicatessen at Snape.

“My father started it in 1929,” said John, 69. “He was made redundant from the steelworks in Hartlepool, moved to the country, got a job in the quarry near Nosterfield and noticed that the butcher and baker had regular door-to-door rounds in the area, so he decided to have a go selling fish. He rode a motorbike, converted the sidecar to a box for the fish. He was disheartened to start with, but began to make a few sales and it went from there. He collected his own fish from Hartlepool, and some of it came to Bedale on the train.

“Now we have a shop in Snape where we smoke all our own salmon, kippers and haddock, and we have a couple of refrigerated fish mobiles for the markets, supply a lot of the local schools, restaurants and pubs and employ 25 people. I’ve tried to retire twice, and now I don’t think I ever will.”

Carrick has done half a day’s work before most trainers have had their first cuppa. “We used to start at 4am, now it’s 2am, and we’re seriously thinking about a night shift,” he said. “If I have one regret it is that life is so much faster. Everyone wants everything yesterday these days. We’re almost 24 hours a day now.”

Racing is an industry in which superstition still colours what and how people do things and, by any standards, the Carricks have been lucky owners, enjoying terrific returns on their shares in horses with Middleham trainer James Bethell.

“We started off with Prince Rossi in 2006,” he recalled. “There were three of us involved in him and he won second time out so that was it – we were hooked. Then Wisdom’s Kiss won four for us. Hartley won a maiden by seven lengths at Catterick, was rarely out of the money, and was beaten a nose in a Listed race at Goodwood before being sold to Hong Kong for £365,000.

“Then we had Harlequin, who was James’s daughter Jessica’s pet [Jessica died of meningitis in 2012]. He won in France, and a handicap at Glorious Goodwood before being invited to go to Dubai, and we had shares in Penhill, who won twice in a week for us once. We sold him to Tony Bloom and he won this year’s Albert Bartlett at Cheltenham for Willie Mullins. One of my managers had £50 each-way on him at 16-1. My wife’s a good judge of a horse, and none of it has been for much outlay.”

So, if Briardale, a five-length winner of the Zetland Cup at Redcar last time, makes the cut for the Royal Hunt Cup or, failing that, the Wolferton Handicap, will the Carricks be loading their car up with lobsters for Ascot? You bet they will.

John Carrick is partowner of Briardale, who runs in the Royal Hunt Cup or Wolferton Handicap