Top trainer who fields a notable roster of racehorses
The new National Hunt season is hotting up and two trainers from the Vale of Glamorgan who have a busy time ahead of them are Llancarfan’s Evan Williams and Aberthin’s Tim Vaughan. Both are former Welsh champion point-topoint riders.
In fact, Williams is a former national point-to-point champion rider. He started training in 2003, some three years before Vaughan was to take out his licence in 2006.
Williams’ best season for winners was in 2015-16 when he saddled 70, one fewer than the 71 that Vaughan sent out last season.
However, in terms of prize money, Williams’ total last season came to £598,389, compared to the £478,013 Vaughan had won for his owners.
Williams, who has come close to saddling a Grand National winner on a couple of occasions, has 81 horses in training, while Vaughan, who trained 2011 Scottish Grand National winner Beshabar, has 75 horses in his yard.
As for their favourite racecourses, Williams has had 90 winners at Ludlow, 83 at Ffos Las (where he trained the very first winner when the track first opened), 37 at Chepstow (where he rode several winners as an amateur rider) and 35 at Worcester and Uttoxeter.
The last-named course has also been a lucky one for Vaughan, who has had 47 winners there, compared to 43 at Worcester and 40 at Ffos Las.
Adam Wedge, who recently won on Williams’ Present Times at Exeter, is his stable jockey while his two conditional riders are Conor Ring and Mitchell Bastyan, 19, who was featured in this column recently. Williams’ daughter Isabel, a successful point-to-point rider, is the yard’s amateur rider.
Horses to watch out for from Williams’ Alberogwrn Farm yard are Present Times, Aqua Dude, Silver Streak, Still Believing, Cesar Collonges and John Constable.
When Vaughan, one of the few National Hunt trainers who can claim to have saddled a five-timer, is not making use of champion jockey Richard Johnson, he relies on Alan Johns and his amateur riders Evan David and Charlie Price. At the time of writing, his conditional jockey George Blackwell, whose father Steve was a point-to-point rider of note, has ridden nine winners and looks to have a bright future.
Six from the Pant Wilkin Stables that may pay to follow are Debece, Looksnowlikebrian, Timely Gift, Officer Hoolihan, Canton Prince and Theligny.
Meanwhile, if you were a past winner of the Dillwyn and Barbara Thomas Welsh Champion Point-ToPoint Riders’ Trophy Award, or if you know someone who was, I would be pleased to hear from you. I would like to know the year you won and the number of winners you rode that season. Where Are They Now? At 5ft 11in, Cardigan-born Hywel Davies was rather tall for a National Hunt jockey. His elder brother Geraint, also a jockey, had to retire prematurely owing to injuries and Hywel, a rare judge of racing pace, certainly had his share of injuries, breaking his pelvis and jaw, and being given the kiss of life after he nearly died in a crashing fall at Doncaster.
Just like the famed Anthony and Rees brothers from west Wales, Hywel learned his trade in point-topoints and when he joined the paid ranks he kicked home more than 700 winners on horses such as Barnbrook Again, Ghofar, Katabatic, Appialto and Royal Derbi.
However, his greatest moment came when he won the 1985 Grand National on Anne Duchess of Westminster’s Last Suspect after pleading with her to let the 11-year-old take his chance.
Hywel gave the tail-swishing 40-1 outsider a cracking ride, and he is convinced that, had his mount Uncle Merlin not stumbled at Becher’s second time round in the 1990 Aintree spectacular, he would have won the race again.
Winner-wise, his best season was the 1982-83 one, when he rode 83 winners to finish third in the jockeys’ table behind John Francome and Peter Scudamore.