King of the Sport of Kings ...and that’s not bad going for a boy from an East Kilbride council estate!
WITH a final burst of speed, Poet’s Society galloped ahead to win last Thursday’s three o’clock handicap at York by a neck.
For the punters who had backed the chestnut gelding at 20 to 1 it was, no doubt, a great moment.
But for Mark Johnston the victory was sweeter still, as it represented the moment on which he had staked his whole career: against all the odds, a boy who had been raised on a council estate in East Kilbride had become the most successful trainer in British racing history.
The win by Poet’s Society was the Scot’s 4,194th victory – a record.
And even though his success on the track is already extraordinary – Mr Johnston has recorded at least 100 winners in each of the last 25 seasons and has earned a multi-million pound fortune – there was no disguising his delight.
The 58-year-old described his pride at becoming Britain’s greatest ever horse trainer and revealed he could not have done it without the support of his loving wife.
Reflecting on his journey to success, from his humble beginnings in Scotland to his time training horses on a beach used by the RAF as a bombing range, he said that living by his business’s ‘always trying’ motto helped him reach his goal.
He revealed, jokingly, that his success ultimately comes down to his father, whose marked lack of success taught him what ‘not’ to do as a horse trainer. He said: ‘I have got to pinch myself to think we got to 4,194. From where we started it is unthinkable. It is a great success and we feel very proud and very happy to have achieved this. I couldn’t have done this without my wife Deirdre, who is also my assistant trainer, and my hard-working team here. But I also owe a huge thanks to my father, my success is all down to him. I often joke that he taught me what not to do as a horse trainer, as he never became successful and none of his three horses ever won a race, but he got me into horses, and it was learning through him when I was younger that got me here today.’
Born in Bellshill, Lanarkshire, in October 1959, Mr Johnston was raised in East Kilbride before moving to Aberfoyle when he was six.
Every Saturday, his father Ronald, a night porter and owner of a TV aerial business with hopes of becoming a professional trainer, took a young Mark to the bookies – his first introduction to the glamour and excitement of horse-racing.
He explained: ‘My father bought his first horse when I was a teenager, then another and another, until he had three, and I helped him out with them for many years. I knew then I wanted to work with horses, it was where my heart was. My
‘Couldn’t have done this without my wife’
wisely wanted me to have a back-up plan, though, so I went to Glasgow University to study veterinary science.
‘But I couldn’t help myself and I continued to learn about racing and horse training on the side, and would even travel to stables in Dunbar every Saturday, and find placements during the summers on dairy farms with stables too, so I could get my degree but also work with race horses too. I wanted as much experience as possible.’
Following his graduation in 1983 Mr Johnston worked as a vet for three years. He moved to Lincolnshire in 1985 and married his childhood sweetheart, and a year later applied for a trainer’s licence at The Jockey Club.
The Scot still recalls what he was told by the then racing authority: ‘Just because you are a vet doesn’t mean you can train a horse.’
Undeterred, in 1987 he gained his licence and started training with a small group of 12 horses – most lame and some borrowed to fulfil the minimum required to secure a licence.
He said: ‘We only started out with horses we could afford, which was not a lot, and it took a while to get our first win.’
In 1987, his maiden victory came when Hinari Video won at Carlisle.
Mr Johnston insists the secret of success has nothing to do with spending money on expensive animals.
He said: ‘It doesn’t come down to cost. Pedigree is the number one thing that is going to set the value, and then it’s confirmation [the degree of ‘correctness’ of a horse’s bone structure, muscles and body proportions in relation to each other]. I have made a name for myself for being willing to compromise on the confirmation and see the horses with faults that we could still train and that could still win us races. We have a reputation for our horses being tough. We run them regularly and our principle is they don’t earn any money or win any races by standing at the stables, so we keep them working every day.
‘Most trainers work their horses six days a week, we work ours for seven. The horse that won yesterday was having his 27th race of this sea- son and many, many horses won’t have 27 races in their life, never mind in a season.
‘So it’s this sort of thing that’s got us this record – he’s won 11 races in his career and he’s four years old only. It’s horses like that which help us notch up the big numbers.’
To get the horses to such high standards requires a tireless and dedicated team, who Mr Johnston admitted he could not have achieved the new record without.
He said: ‘We start work at 6am and the first horse goes out at 6.15am. The horses are exercised through to 12pm, then most of the time they go to race in the afternoon.
‘It’s a long day though, because when we return home in the evening, the horses are then groomed, weighed and fed in their stables. I’m then normally at my desk until midparents night, before it all starts again the next day. But it’s all worth it.’
Mr Johnston and his wife moved to North Yorkshire and started to build a northern powerhouse of racing at Middleham, a stables which is today worth £3.5 million. He hopes he can pass his growing business to his eldest son, Charlie.
Mr Johnston said: ‘We encouraged Charlie to work in a vet practice like I did, and he went to Glasgow and got a degree. He has worked in the business here for more than two years. He probably loves it more than me, he’s been brought up with it throughout his life.’
Among Mr Johnston’s notable victories are horses such as Attraction, which landed the English and Irish 1,000 Guineas double in 2004, and Mister Baileys, which was his first Classic winner in 1994 when it won the 2,000 Guineas.
Now a record-breaking trainer in Britain, Mr Johnston revealed his quest is to land more Classics.
He said: ‘The big goal is more Classic winners, more top quality winners. We want the numbers as well, and it’s important for us to keep churning out winners.
‘As with all sport, it’s about winning, there’s no good being a good loser. But going forward it’s about continuing to build the business and up the quality year on year.’
Twenty-five years ago Mr Johnston adopted the motto ‘always trying’ for his business, which he believed sums up every person and horse in the company.
And even though he has just secured UK racing’s most impressive record, it is clear it is a motto he will continue to live by.