Early morning, and the rising sun greets first Memories of a Classic hero lot at Kingsley Park (Picture by Mikaelle Lebreton) It is 25 years since won the 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket in 1994. Here JOHN SCANLON looks back on that record-breaking success which was a major landmark in Mark Johnston’s burgeoning training career.

HE son of Hinari Televideo, ridden by Robellino’s win was Debbie Kettlewell, jumped into significant in so the mix in the straight. It was many ways: it was after that gallop that Mark theT first precious taste of Classic realised he had a serious success for Mark Johnston; the contender for the Guineas. first Classic win for horses Mister Baileys won three of trained north of the Trent since his five juvenile races. He turned Mrs McArdy won the 1,000 a six-furlong maiden at Guineas in 1977; and the first Newcastle into a procession on Classic winner trained in his debut, slamming 12 Middleham since Dante won the opponents by seven lengths. 1945 Derby at Newmarket. Stepping up to seven furlongs at And, just for good measure, Newbury next time out, he 25 years on, Mister Baileys’ inexplicably trouble in winning time of 1m 35.08s, running in a field of five, remains the fastest winning time finishing strongly but only in ever recorded in the race – faster Mister Baileys and Jason Weaver, third. than the marks recorded by such yellow and green silks, win the Guineas in 1994 Next time out he posted an greats of the sport as , excellent performance to land , , and Sea early in 1994 on the Low Moor on pretty the (Group 3) at Goodwood, The Stars. soft ground. Double Trigger went the best before disappointing when favourite for the The public gallops in Middleham were an of the two which, if you know how Trigger at York. It subsequently exciting place to be in the summer of 1993. worked at home, was just ridiculous. transpired that ringworm might have Not only was Mister Baileys being put However, that told us Mister Baileys accounted for his below-par display on the through his paces, but the Johnston string wouldn’t go a yard on soft ground and Knavesmire. included another exciting juvenile in Double convinced us we would need to take him to a A cracking win in the Trigger. Their (Group 2) at trainer Ascot over a remembers them Mister Baileys wouldn’t go a yard mile at the end as being very of September, different. on soft ground and convinced us when partnered “Mister by Frankie Baileys was a we would need to take him to a Dettori, very easy horse confirmed to train,” Mark Mister Baileys recalls. racecourse before the Guineas as the Best “Paul Venner, Juvenile trained the owner, told in the North in me before he sent him to me that he was the racecourse before the Guineas.” 1993 and verified his credentials as a serious nicest he’d had. But they were very different The horse enjoyed two racecourse gallops Guineas candidate. creatures – both weighed almost exactly the before Newmarket. The first was at Thirsk, For the season’s first Classic, Frankie same but Double Trigger was taller and but the second at Ripon was the most could have ridden Mister Baileys having won much narrower, as one would expect of a significant. Jason Weaver rode Mister on him at Ascot, but he chose , staying type. Baileys there, while Bobby Elliott partnered “They worked together at least once, Beware of Agents and the older sprinter Continued on p.24 16 23 Continued from p.23 and so Jason Weaver took the ride. Mark was concerned about the draw, recalling: The life of my horse – and the horse of my life “King’s Theatre was the favourite and was drawn on the stands’ side. Everyone thought that’s where the pace would be.” The big day started for Mark and Deirdre with a Harrods’ picnic in the car F YOU could stop the clock then and there, bidding past Paul’s client’s limit. So, when Paul that he was linked to me, the vendor – and both park with business partners Brian and Val I during those two furlongs… I’ve won it. Paul Venner, the owner was out, I tapped him on the shoulder and said backed off. Needless to say, I have of course told Palmer. “Loads of our owners were there, I’ve done it. He’s done it. I’ve got the next ‘keep going’. Giles many, many times since what a berk he and it made for a great build-up to the Nijinsky. Michael Swinburn, Walter’s brother, of Mister Baileys, “I rang George, who is sensible and calm and was! I usually get a great buzz out of turning race itself,” says Mark. is jumping about behind me, with his hands on reflects on the story the very opposite of me, to tell him that our something over for a profit, but in this case I was In little over a minute and a half, on my shoulders, buffering me about while riding a company had just bought a foal. There was then so insulted, that nobody wanted him for more April 30, 1994, Mister Baileys entered finish, with an endless stream of expletives. My of his Classic hero in a silence. ‘Why?’ George finally asked. ‘Because than that, that it made it an easy decision to history by winning the 2,000 wife is about to pass out from hyperventilation. he just had to be bought,’ I replied. ‘How are we keep him.” Guineas, having edged out Grand Lodge And the noise… these extracts from an going to pay for it?’ was his next question, after Named, perhaps portentously, Mister Baileys, and by a short head. “It was just the most extraordinary feeling, another pause. ‘With the company overdraft, of the colt was sent to Johnston, by then training After the race, Mark was exasperated the best day’s racing, full stop, that I’ve ever had article in Bloodstock course!’ I said…” in Middleham. “When I dropped him off, I told to find he couldn’t locate his winner. “I – and am ever likely to have,” says Paul Venner Ten months later, the flashy but gangly colt, Mark that there was no rush with him, that started to think something had gone of the 1994 Derby, in which his 2,000 Guineas Digest. We are bought for 10,000gns, went to as a nobody thought he’d be early as a two-year-old wrong,” he explains, “but then I winner Mister Baileys put up one of the most yearling and was there to be sold. “When he but that I had a really good feeling about him,” Paul Venner discovered that, for the first time, the remarkable front-running performances in the grateful to Milo came into the ring, I told Mark Johnston to bid Venner remembers. “And I didn’t then hear officials were keeping the horse out on the race’s history. him up to 15,000gns, but to let him go after from Mark for about six weeks. But one day he track until all the other horses were in. Then again, nothing about this horse was ever Corbett of Bloodstock that,” says Venner. rang up and said: ‘You know that horse you sent end of June, far earlier than his owners expected. Once we reached the winner’s enclosure, it ordinary. His is a story that begins with “Michael Bell and Giles Bravery were bidding me? You might just be right about him.’” He then somehow got boxed-in a five-runner was pandemonium, with all my owners inauspicious origins: waste bread, a rather large Digest and to Paul for for him. They both saw Mark raise his hand at Might just be right? He made a successful congratulating Paul.” debt and a broken-down former racehorse in a 10,500gns and worked out, not unreasonably, racecourse debut in a Newcastle maiden at the Continued on p.26 paddock by a kitchen window. Venner and his allowing us to repeat Significance business partner, George Knowles, persuaded their bank manager to back them as they sought them in the Klarion. Celebrations were held in Baileys Horse to take over a business which was on its knees Owner Paul Venner hugs groom Gary Feeds’ box in the old stand, then at and owed them quite a lot of money – not to Ritchie as Mister Baileys and Jason Weaver Walter Cowe’s house at Hascombe Stud mention the £600,000 it owed the bank, too. enter the winner’s enclosure and latterly at the Coronation Hotel in The business processed waste bread, and the and carrying the ‘Baileys’ name not only for Newmarket. Mark remembers clearly that two of them would build it up to 500 tonnes’ promotion but also to keep the Inland Revenue a rather delicate Paul Venner settled the worth a week. When one of its main suppliers sweet on the idea. And the company bought a bill with hotelier Eric Kettenaker by pulled the plug, though, necessity would prove foal, too – on the Saturday of the December handing over a large wad of notes. “Next the mother of invention. Sales in 1991. morning, he found the receipt and exact “It was forced on us, from the blue, so we “You couldn’t make it up!” Venner laughs. change in his pocket – not even a tip had switched to buying grain,” Paul recalls. “My friend Paul Thorman had rung me to say been taken!” “We put in a microniser, which cooked it, and that he’d seen the most lovely foal down in The colt’s memorable success had a switched the whole business to horse feed Dorset, and I’d thought no more of it. When I huge significance for Mark and Deirdre. instead. That’s how Baileys Horse Feeds got to Tattersalls, though, I saw a wonderful At the end of 1994, they were able to started.” Robellino foal and thought to myself, ‘that’s the expand the business through the And that horse in the paddock? one, I’ve got to have him’, and rushed off to see acquisition of Warwick House, taking “A Scottish vet, who was working for the Paul and tell him. ‘You prat,’ Paul said to me. yard capacity to more than 100 horses for local practice in Braintree, came to look at it ‘That’s the very foal I’ve been trying to tell you the first time. The 1994 campaign saw one day,” recalls Venner. about…’ them record 100 domestic Flat wins, a “He said he was determined to train “The whole scenario was miraculous,” recalls feat they have accomplished every year . I told him, ‘for God’s sake, Venner. since. And, towards the end of 1993, it don’t be so bloody stupid.’ Naturally that was “Paul said he had a client who’d like him to was announced that Sheikh Mohammed like a red rag to a bull.” bid on the foal, so I said ‘fair enough, I’ll be would have six two-year-olds in training It goes rather without saying, but of course standing right behind you’. He came into the at Kingsley House the following season. that vet was Mark Johnston, and when he set up ring, a gangly little horse with long legs, back at shop as a trainer, on a seaside bombing range in the knee and lots of white on him, but with so ISTER BAILEYS’ dazzling Lincolnshire, Venner would become his first much presence that he just had to be bought. M Guineas win really was a game- owner. Funnily enough, since then I’ve only ever seen changer in the history of Mark Johnston Back in East Anglia, the company bought a one horse in that ring with so much presence – and Johnston Racing, and Mark will be couple of pregnant mares, to produce foals for and that was Bosra Sham as a yearling. eternally grateful to Paul for entrusting the December Sales and to show not only what As the bidding started, I could see Paul him with the care of his ‘wonderful its products could do, but also that Baileys ‘did’ beginning to sweat and then running out of Robellino foal’. it rather than just talking about it. There were both steam and budget. There was one man, a one or two in training, too, for the same reason German, sitting right at the front and he kept Continued from p.25 certainly not happy, but said that we might as eight lengths clear, without the jockey asking well have Jason Weaver instead. He was just a for any effort. It had echoes of Secretariat’s year out of his apprenticeship and lacked big- Belmont Stakes. “He ran far, far further than I conditions race at Newbury. Amends were made race experience, but was riding plenty of winners ever thought he could,” his owner recalls. “The in the Vintage Stakes at Glorious Goodwood for Mark.” horse was in perfect rhythm, going at the speed before it all went wrong, again, in the Gimcrack And naturally of course it was Grand Lodge he wanted to go. He was balanced, he flew. And at York. whom Mister Baileys and Weaver would beat at he then ran into a brick wall – and as the “The reason Mister Baileys was so good was Newmarket. “The whole experience of Guineas epitome of courage, he just ran until he couldn’t very simple, and both Mark and I spotted it day was surreal,” Venner remembers. “I wasn’t run any further. That was just his mental straight away: he was basically a herd leader,” up in the stand, with Mark: I love being down attitude. says Venner. “It was a mental thing. Mark there on the ground, near the winning post, so I “The difference between the two Classics was trained him like that, always allowing him to couldn’t see a lot. He came flashing past, with that the Guineas was pretty pie-in-the-sky, to be lead the string. Nothing was ever allowed to go Grand Lodge, and I didn’t know he’d won. The honest, a bit of a dream, a punt, a jolly, a let’s- past him at home. For a young trainer, Mark see-how-we-go. In contrast, the Derby was was already a genius and very, very clever. I sober, it was reality, it was within touching don’t know what came first: Mark training distance of greatness and the stakes were so horses to make the running, or this horse much higher. Epsom gave us two tables, free of making the running, but I’ve watched him a lot charge, with endless champagne, to thank us for over the years, and he never makes the same bringing the Guineas winner. We took two mistake twice. In the Gimcrack, though, this coach-loads of people and closed the factory for horse was held up and just had absolutely no the day: all the staff went. It was extraordinary idea what was going on.” In the Royal Lodge and of course I’d love to do it all over again.” Stakes at Ascot, a young Frankie Dettori would As a horse, Mister Baileys’ value wasn’t just take the ride – and won by just letting Mister about what he was as an asset, measurable only Baileys run his race at the speed he wanted to go. in covering fees or prize-money. What he would And now for the moment which every be worth from an advertising and marketing racehorse owner both craves and dreads in equal point of view remains impossible to quantify. However, identifying that there was a value measure. In this example, though, it needs to be Mister Baileys and Jason Weaver taken in context, for it is of fundamental beyond what the horse was worth as a racehorse importance to the story itself. or potential stallion was probably what enabled first thing I said to Brough Scott was, ‘he did his trainer to twist the owner’s arm into running Million win, didn’t he?’ After the race, we ended up in a at Epsom. box in the stand, with the champagne flowing, “I cannot agree that is a bad commercial Of course the offers to buy the horse came that and it was getting warm and rowdy in there.” decision to run in the Derby,” Johnston had winter, and we have already established that the In a rather unlikely route for a Guineas written in his last-ditch fax on the day of the owner enjoys turning assets over for a profit. In winner, it was to the Dante at York that Mister Derby entry-acceptance stage. “The publicity this case, if the ‘in cost’ was just 10,000gns, that Baileys would head next. “You know whose idea alone must be worth more than the forfeit fee profit could be substantial. Why on earth, then, that was,” his owner relates. “It certainly wasn’t and the advertising implications of Epsom are didn’t he sell? bloody well mine! A mile and two furlongs, for a better than for any other race. If he proves not “Hmmm,” he says; and pauses. “That horse by Robellino out of a mare? to stay, it will not damage his stud value, just as business, F H Nash, which George and I Probably entirely predictably, in retrospect, it did not harm that of Blushing Groom, originally took over for £600,000… By then it it all went wrong on the Knavesmire: Weaver or .” owed maybe £800,000 or a million,” admits rode him with restraint, to get the trip, and Venner. “It was making money, but we’d taken holding him up just didn’t work – again. Outsider on a lot of debt and hadn’t banked on interest “I then told Mark – and repeatedly so – that rates becoming punitive. Businesses only run on as far as I was concerned, we weren’t going to “The whole adventure of my life is welded to cashflow: it’s not about assets being worth this run him in the Derby,” says Venner. “The Mister Baileys,” says Venner. “For years, I was or that, it’s about money in your bank account.” problem was that Mark and I have always been making horse feed, products that I knew were And there’s another pause, followed by a extraordinarily similar: he’s a rotten loser; and the best, but I just could not sell them to trainers rather candid admission. “I had only one way of so am I, and he doesn’t back down. We just went – I was an outsider until he came along. And getting us out of what was now a very deep hole, around and around in circles on the phone. It instead of me knocking on their doors and and that was through this horse. I was offered ended up with him sending me a fax on the day getting nowhere, now I could just go racing and £250,000 and I was offered £400,000. But even of the last forfeit stage for the Derby, asking me trainers would come up and put their hand on £400,000 was no good to me at all at that point: to change my mind. I’ve still got it. It came at my shoulder. it wasn’t enough to get us out of the shit. That’s 11:06 that morning and the Weatherbys “You cannot put a value on that, even if the why I had to ride this horse, metaphorically, all deadline was noon… facts are that when Mister Baileys came along, the way – I just had to ride my luck all the way, “It was Jason’s idea to try to make all at our turnover was £3million and is now too. Epsom – all I knew was that he wouldn’t hold £28million, maybe more. I’ve always focused on “All through the winter we thought we’d him up. Mark still says, even today, that he went racing and breeding as the target aim at the 2,000 Guineas,” says Venner, “and too fast: I’d say that’s absolute baloney.” The market for the company. There could never be a we went a long way thinking that Frankie, facts remain, though, that he did make all, and better advertisement in that market than a horse who’d ridden him to win the Royal Lodge, as all the other runners had to sort themselves like him, and with a name like his, who did what would be available to ride him at Newmarket. It out after a lot of bumping and barging in the he did at both Epsom and Newmarket. We’ve was quite late in the day when we found out he descent to Tattenham Corner, Weaver and never looked back – and, obviously, neither has was going to be on Grand Lodge instead. I was Mister Baileys suddenly skipped six, seven or Mark!” 26