THE MAKING OF A WINNER
Returning to scene of one of jockey George Duffield’s greatest triumphs
GEORGE DUFFIELD smiles when he recalls the dressing down that he received after riding his first winner 50 years ago. “You were bloody hopeless there,” said the blunt-speaking trainer Jack Waugh.
Fast forward five decades and Duffield – now 70 years young – returns to the scene of one of his greatest ever triumphs when he lines up in today’s Clipper Logistics Leger Legends Stakes at Doncaster.
It’s also a quarter of a century since the proud Yorkshireman won the St Leger on the brilliant User Friendly, a Classic victory that helped repay the early faith shown by the redoubtable Waugh, who was the jockey’s early mentor.
Just one of 2,547 winners that Duffield recorded in Britain before retiring from the saddle in 2005, he hopes to add to his tally in today’s race that sees retired jockeys raise money for Jack Berry House, the Injured Jockeys Fund rehab centre in Malton, and Doncaster’s Northern Racing College.
First staged in 2010, the event has raised £775,000 so far and remains the only charity race staged under the rules of racing.
Duffield has never been out of the first four in five previous efforts, though victory remains tantalisingly elsuive. He still rides out twice a week at his wife Ann’s Constable Burton stables near Leyburn and will certainly not be lacking for fitness when he partners Soldier Blue for Malton trainer Brian Ellison after being given special dispensation to compete by the British Horseracing Authority because of his proven experience.
Yet, while Duffield was taken aback by the admonishment he received after riding Syllable to victory at Yarmouth in the summer of 1967, he’s the first to admit that he owes his career – and subsequent successes – to the aforementioned Waugh who concluded his no nonsense appraisal by saying “by no means are you a jockey or look like being one at the moment”.
He was, says the retired rider, the perfect trainer, task-masker, disciplinarian and father figure for the young apprentice who had left the West Yorkshire mining village of Stanley to move to Newmarket at the age of 15 and weighing a ridiculously light five stone.
“That was his way of putting you straight back on the ground,” recalled Duffield in an exclusive interview with The
Yorkshire Post. “At the time, I was gobsmacked and gutted for him to say that.
“When I got a little bit older and looked back, and realised why he had done it, it was a fantastic thing to do and the right thing to do. He was a lot cleverer than me. Being a young kid who was not worldly, and who was away from home, he thought his duty was to keep the young lads on the straight and narrow. I owe my whole career to him.”
It worked. Waugh opened an account with Halifax Building Society for Duffield who was left out of pocket when he bought a £50 suit from the Co-op that he was to pay off on a weekly basis. Busy riding, he entrusted the paying-in book to a stable lad who simply kept the money.
Duffield’s love affair with horses began as a child when he cycled across Wakefield to ride horses for Jimmy Walsh at Nostell Priory. “I loved all the smells – the smell of the leather, the horse, the muck, the hay. It’s a very special smell. I got the bug from there.”
Yet, with Walsh fully staffed, he recommended the young rider to Waugh – an apprenticeship that was to endure and see Duffield come into contact with a young Sir Mark Prescott, who would later take over the famous Heath House stables and enjoy an incredibly successful alliance with the Yorkshireman.
Even Prescott, still a man of great precision, was not immune from Waugh’s orders. Asked to write out the next day’s entries in pencil, the young assistant trainer made the mistake of doing so in pen and was taken aback when his hard work was torn to shreds – literally. “Details mattered,” said Duffield.
“The guv’nor said to Mark ‘Whatever you put him on, that will go faster for him than anyone else’. But the guv’nor never told me that. He was a pleasure to work for. You knew what he wanted and what he expected. There were no short cuts. Everyone had two horses to look after. Now they have four, five or six. He was real Edwardian, a real disciplinarian but honest as the day’s long. He saw something I didn’t recognise, I wasn’t ready, mentally or physically, but he saw something.”
Duffield was able to repay that faith in 1992 when, at the venerable age of 45, he won the Epsom Oaks on trainer Clive Brittain’s brilliant filly User Friendly, and then the St Leger.
They were only denied the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe because Europe’s showpiece race, says the jockey, was run at a dawdle and became a sprint rather than a test of stamina.
“The Leger was a very special day being a Yorkshireman and coming not far from Doncaster,” said Duffield. “To be able to wear the silly hat they give to the winning jockey, I thought I would never get a chance to put it on. Lester Piggott, Willie Carson, they’d all done it, but not me.
“When I won the Oaks, I rang Mr Waugh up. The Guv’nor was still alive then (he died in 1999). He’d never trained a Classic winner to his regret – Oncidium was his best horse and favourite for the 1964 Epsom Derby, but faded out of contention. I said ‘At last you’ve trained a Classic winner’. And he cried.”
FOR A jockey who was told that he was “bloody useless” after riding his first winner in 1967, jockey George Duffield has shown remarkable resilience. Fifty years, and 2,547 winners, later, the Yorkshire miner’s son is back in the saddle today at Doncaster. He’s one of the retired riders taking part in the annual Leger Legends race that, since its inception in 2010, has raised more than £775,000 for the Northern Racing College and Jack Berry House, the Injured Jockeys Fund’s rehab centre in Malton.
Now the precursor to the St Leger meeting, the importance of these two racing charities should not be under-estimated to racing or Yorkshire. And nor should the perseverance of George Duffield – a waif-like figure who left home at the age of 15 and kept striving to improve himself for three decades before finally winning the St Leger 25 years ago on the remarkable User Friendly. Victory today would be a fitting finale to a racing career that continues to be defined by its sheer cussedness.