McCoy's milestone

Lydia Hislop13 April 2012

It took 55 years for jockey Sir Gordon Richards' record of 269 winners in one season to be eclipsed. It is hard to imagine the new milestone Tony McCoy will have set when the current National Hunt term ends on 27 April being bettered in his lifetime - unless it is by that tireless individual himself.

An unquenchable desire for victory sets him apart - the miles he will travel, the pounds he will waste, the duration for which he will kick, drive and niggle his mount forward in search of one more win. Through sheer force of determination, he conjures victory from defeat every week.

The other key factor in McCoy's success is his association with fellow multiple record-breaker, soon-to-be-crowned 12-time champion jumps trainer Martin Pipe. A kingmaker, whoever he retains, already has one hand on the jockeys' trophy. A grand total of 176 of McCoy's wins to date this term hailed from Pond House Stables.

Trainer Jonjo O'Neill also supplies McCoy with regular rides and top jockeys' agent Dave Roberts tracks down spares. McCoy's current supremacy of 158 over Richard Johnson is set to be the largest margin-of victory, but is exaggerated by the fact injury sidelined that rival for almost 100 days this term.

Born on 4 May 1974, McCoy registered his first-ever winner as a conditional jockey (National Hunt equivalent of apprentice) when Chickabiddy won at Exeter in 1994, having been tempted to Britain from his native Ireland by trainer Toby Balding. Seven years later, he registered his 1,500th success at the same track.

On 17 September 2001, he posted his fastest century of winners. On 2 March this year, he beat his own record for the most wins in a season by a jump jockey - 253, registered in 1997/98. He now has 21 days' racing to put his latest record beyond reach by breaking the 300 mark.

McCoy is set to become the greatest-jump jockey in history. But although he completed the Champion Hurdle-Gold Cup double on Make A Stand and Mr Mulligan at the 1997 Cheltenham Festival, his status hinges on the quantity - rather than quality - of his winners. It is to his immense credit that he consistently brings out the best in his mounts, day in day out. The same could be said of Richards. He partnered less than half of Lester Piggott's total of 30 British classic wins, the last of his 14 victories coming on Pinza in the 1953 Derby on his 28th and final attempt at the race.

The best horse he rode was 2,000 Guineas hero Tudor Minstrel in his record-setting season of 1947.

Much in demand by top trainers in a golden age of jockeyship, Richards was retained by Fred Darling, who provided 55 of those 269 wins.

Richards was naturally lean, avoiding the debilitating effects of wasting endured by other riders.

McCoy's minimum is 10st 2lb, but he has been known to sweat down to an unhealthy-looking 10st just to ride one sure-fire winner.

Richards' record was established without the current winnerspinning benefit of 12-month seasons and evening meetings. In 1947, the Flat term spanned just eight months but Richards, who turned 43 that May, maintained a steady strike-rate throughout.

That year's jockeys' title was Richards' 20th in a haul totalling 26 on his retirement in 1954. The 4,870 races he won is still a UK best, but the world record has since passed between three US-based riders - Yorkshire-born John Longden, Bill Shoemaker and Laffit Pincay, who is still adding to his 9,200-plus wins today.

McCoy already has his seventh successive jockeys' title in the bag and, with 1,583 winners to date, will doubtless next season surpass the 1,699 career total of jump racing's current winning-most jockey, Richard Dunwoody, whose career was cut short through injury in December 1999.

Other than Dunwoody's final irreparable damage to his right hand, it is a feature of both his and McCoy's careers that in this highly dangerous sport they are remarkably injury-free. But Richards' greater opportunity and inclination for recuperation was rewarded with career longevity. McCoy's greatest risk is burn-out.

When Richards was poised to break the record in 1933, he was subject to media attention of Pop Idol proportions. Photographers were billeted at his house and he was invited to the House of Commons for a formal dinner in his honour. It goes to show what a diminished profile racing cuts in modern life.

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