My Racing Adventures 



final run so as to paralyse the opposition in the 

 nick of time. 



I do not believe, however, in giving a good 

 jockey too many orders, because in a jumping 

 race you have to go where you find yourself at 

 the fences, and it is not possible always to have 

 things adjusted exactly to suit you. Being told 

 to wait, one may just as well do so in front as 

 behind, if it is a slow-run race. A clever jockey 

 uses his own discretion as to what sort of a 

 battle is being waged, and he acts accordingly. 

 Hampering him with a mass of instructions is 

 not likely to contribute to his success. He can- 

 not know what is best to be done till the crisis 

 arrives. 



At a race meeting in the Midlands, I remember, 

 an old-fashioned trainer gave me a most elaborate 

 code of rules showing me how to ride a mare of 

 his in a hurdle handicap. He said that I must 

 wait with her till after clearing the final obstacle, 

 and then do the trick in style by a flash of speed 

 on the flat. That programme, as arranged, was 

 carried out by me in its exactitude, save for a 

 trifling detail — the flash of speed anticipated was 

 not good enough in the last few strides. I was 

 second. On the following day, at the same 

 meeting, this mare was in a race of a similar 



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