Racing will miss AP McCoy more than he will miss it
In keeping with the celebratory mood, McCoy was happy to keep that lantern chin up and play along with the jokes amid all the backslaps and renditions of “For he’s a jolly good fellow”.
How about a job mucking out the stables at Jonjo O’Neill’s Jackdaws Castle yard? Or becoming a digger driver like J.P McManus once was? Or working behind the counter at a branch of William Hill? Or, as Clare Balding wondered, couldn’t he become a fireman? “Nah, that’s a proper job and I’m not brave enough for that,” joked the flintiest sportsman you ever saw.
Yet underlying all the chuckles came a genuine, poignant glimpse into McCoy’s worries about his step into mundanity after the thundering hooves of a lifetime of thrills, adrenaline, glory and pain.
He suddenly sounded like Superman in a world without telephone boxes.
“I’ve got nothing to look forward to at the moment,” he said, looking utterly glum until the laughter of the audience and a nudge from Jonjo alerted him to the fact that this wallowing might not go down to well with one particular listener. “Apart from my wife and kids,” he added hastily.
Of course, Chanelle McCoy could afford a forgiving smile. This had been an astonishing day, a deserved afternoon of homage to her husband, she reckoned.
Ah, that long guard of honour from his fellow jockeys, the serenading from the grandstands, the outpouring of a rare affection for a humble champ which left him moist-eyed as he and his final mount, the suitably-named but sadly underperforming Box Office, trotted in front of the grandstand for one last time.
It all made Chanelle think of “the hundreds of hours he’d been in the hot bath sweating and losing weight, all the nights that he spent in the hospital and all the nights he went to bed hungry.” For one last day, she felt it had all been worth the sacrifices for both him and his family.
Yet now it was all over and no-one understood better than her why her extraordinary obsessive should be telling everyone that he sensed “the fear of retirement for me is only going to get worse over the next few weeks.”
“Oh, he’s going to dreadfully miss it.
“There will be lonely and empty days ahead of him but he’s only looking at the positive things,” mused Chanelle. Two small, beautiful things, in particular, as little Eve and Archie McCoy could now find dad taking them on the daily school run.
Think of all those small pleasures he could now enjoy, she smiled.
“We haven’t had cooked potatoes for so long….he can spend time with the kids, he can eat, he can go and play golf…” Tim Henman has invited him to go and play tennis at Wimbledon.
His beloved Arsenal were ready to treat him as an Emirates VIP.
Yesterday, on the first Sunday of the rest of his life, he had what he described as a “nice breakfast” and not just a cup of sugary tea.
This week, when the new British jumps season kicks off on Thursday, instead of having a full book of rides at Sedgefield and then zooming off by helicopter to Newton Abbot to get a head start in his quest for a 21st straight title, McCoy will instead be a spectator at Punchestown. And it will feel very weird indeed, he accepts.
Yet this first trip to Ireland as an ex-jockey, he felt, would actually prove the perfect antidote to any self-pity. Because tomorrow, he will visit Robbie McNamara, who recently underwent spinal surgery after a terrible fall at Wexford, in hospital and on Wednesday, he will see McNamara’s cousin, J.T, who’s battling to forge a new life after the accident at the Cheltenham Festival two years ago which left him paralysed.
“It’ll be nice to see them and it will put things into perspective pretty quickly, reminding me I’ve actually got very little to be worrying about. It’ll put my head straight,” said McCoy.
“I’ve seen the very tough side of this sport when colleagues and friends were severely injured. I feel very lucky that I have ended my career in one piece. Those lads that we lost along the way I will never forget and the lads that are injured, we’ll still try to do the best possible for them.”
This is the positivity we want from McCoy. He has a whole new world of opportunity ahead of him, exciting new races to run. J.P McManus, describing him as an employee who’ll always give you your money’s worth, noted intriguingly when asked if he might find another role for McCoy in his empire: “I’m delighted that he might still want to play a part — you know we’ve never really discussed it but I’m sure we’d work something out.”
His fellow jockeys seem sure that whatever their old friend turns his hand to next will be a success. Because, as Ruby Walsh put it: “He’s so bloody good at everything he does!”
And as a jockey? “He’s no more driven than Dicky (Johnson), he doesn’t have a bigger weight issue than Davy Russell or (Barry) Geraghty or Jason Maguire and he’s probably had as many falls as I have,” mused Ruby. “But he’s just better than us, just the best. As simple as that.”
Indeed, perhaps the abiding memory of what Walsh rightly called “this monumental day” were the wave upon wave of generous, wholly unforced tributes from the blokes who have spent so many years being forced to see ‘Stobart’ imprinted on McCoy’s backside.
After 16 times finishing as runner-up to him in the jockeys’ championship, how right it was that Richard Johnson should end up winning their last race together.
‘Dicky’, utterly overshadowed while actually being one of the best jump jockeys of all-time, could have been forgiven for cheering the old dominator’s farewell. Instead, he was as tearful as McCoy. “It’s sad. He’s been one of my best friends for a long time,” he said, admitting what a hole his old tormentor’s absence would leave in the heart of National Hunt.
Didn’t that say everything about McCoy? It said that even his greatest rivals did not mind getting beaten by a genius. It said that, great as he was a horseman, he was an even better man. Of course, he will miss racing — but racing will miss him so much more.
