It is seldom easy to know what is going on behind the helmet and goggles of a jockey, especially one as inscrutable as Jimmy Fortune. Until recently, though, the answer was a lot of physical pain, along with the mental torment of wondering how much longer he could tolerate it just to go on riding horses.
Without the back surgery that saved his career, albeit with the need of a ten-month sabbatical, this Flat season would have lost one of its stirring narratives. Fortune, just past his 35th birthday and as unassuming as they come, upstaged his neon-lit rivals at Royal Ascot and is enviably placed to do the same when Newmarket’s July Festival begins today.
Nannina and Winker Watson, two of his five winners at the royal meeting, headline Fortune’s book of rides during three days on this sumptuously enhanced course. He could also pick up the biggest prize of the week when Dutch Art drops back to sprinting for the July Cup on Friday.
Fortune reflects on his decade of discomfort from a spinal problem without sourness. “Pain does get you down,” he said. “It was worrying and it took me a long time to get it right. I still have to do stretching exercises every morning before I start work but I can ride without pain and I’m a happier person for it.”
Not, though, an exuberant or emotional person. Anything but. Fortune wryly admits that his weighing-room friends teased him for not smiling enough during his wondrous week at Ascot but it was not because he was unappreciative, simply that he has learnt to be philosophical.
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He knew, for instance, that it could have been him, and not Frankie Dettori, riding Authorized to Derby glory three weeks earlier. “They booked me for the horse back in March and I was thrilled. Unfortunately for me, Godolphin had nothing for the Dante and Frankie became available. But you can’t dwell on what might have been. Racing is like a big wheel and you’ve got to accept the lows as well as the highs.”
Equally typical of Fortune is his rebuttal of Peter Chapple-Hyam’s attempt to take responsibility for Dutch Art’s defeat in the St James’s Palace Stakes. “I’m as much to blame, I rode him all wrong,” he said. “I should have been braver on him but we went for the safe option and it didn’t pay off. I’ll need to ride him handier over six furlongs on Friday.”
Winker Watson, another of Chapple-Hyam’s string, endorsed Fortune’s quiet confidence when winning the Norfolk Stakes at Ascot. “I thought he was my banker of the meeting. He’ll improve again for the step up to six furlongs this week and I’m very hopeful he can win again.”
Nannina generates affection as well as hope. “I’ve ridden her for three years now and she’s a special filly. Everyone knows she’s best on good ground, so I was concerned about any rain getting to Newmarket. If they avoid it, the ground should be perfect for her in the Falmouth.”
Today’s field is high-class but Fortune singled out two opponents. “I hope Speciosa runs, because she’ll make it a proper test. I’d say the biggest danger will be the South African horse, Irridescence, but Nannina has a tremendous turn of foot and, on her day, she’s very hard to beat.”
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There will be no time to celebrate, even if it occurred to him. Kempton’s evening card beckons, just as it did after his second-day treble at Ascot. Fortune, though, refuses to pursue every extreme of the fixture list. He said: “I used to chase around two meetings every day but I see no benefit in it now. When you’re working that hard. chasing your tail, you can’t concentrate and give things your full attention. I want to be riding in ten years’ time and if I burn myself out, I’m not going to be.” Pain, it seems, teaches prudence as well as appreciation.