The champion racehorse trainer on quality over quantity and preserving Newmarket.
AS an avid follower of the Turf since early teenage, it’s a poignant moment when, shortly after arriving at Clarehaven racing stables, I watch John Gosden and Frankie Dettori standing for a few moments on the lawn beside a bronze statue of Golden Horn. What a trio: Mr Gosden, the towering master trainer with the rock-hewn profile that could have graced a John Ford Western; his jockey, the dapper, tanned Italian, looking as if he’d flown in from Monte Carlo; and Golden Horn, the brilliant colt whose Derby victory in 2015 cemented the pair’s successful racetrack reunion after a break of many years.
For most trainers, that year with Sir Philip Oppenheimer owned and bred Golden Horn, a colt that went on to win the Eclipse Stakes and the Arc De Triomphe, would have been a crowning career achievement. However, for this Newmarket yard, the glories have kept on coming.
Remarkably, four of the past five Cartier Horse of the Year awards have gone to Gosden-trained horses: Kingman, Golden Horn, Enable and Roaring Lion. ‘The truth is, we’ve been fortunate to have had a succession of good years,’ agrees Mr. Gosden, settling down to talk in his office, the walls lined with prints of his former Flat stars.
‘We had three champions on one day at Ascot (the October Champions Day meeting), wound up with a record amount of prize money and Enable, having won the Arc, went to America and took the Breeders’ Cup Turf. Look, it was an extraordinary season. One never does expect to repeat something like that, but you’d be very happy to win some of those races again.’
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