Racing: Burden of finding winners weighs heavily on McCoy

There was a strange joylessness about Tony McCoy as he broached a new frontier at Wincanton, the moment he became the first jockey, perhaps the only jockey there ever will be, to partner 2,000 winners as a National Hunt rider.

"This is a small step for a man," could have been the start of Neil Armstrong's equivalent, "but it's painful because I've got a hole in one of my socks." That was the sort of ambivalence McCoy brought to his new horizon on Saturday.

The champion has found his own brave, untouched world precisely because he thinks the milepost is not denoted by a hill of beans. It is one of sport's greatest and truest maxim's that to achieve success you take one small event at a time. A point, a ball or, in AP's case, a ride.

Tony McCoy, as he acknowledges himself, is probably not the best jockey there has ever been, despite the statistical tale. If the measure was elegance or style he would probably struggle to reach the podium.

McCoy's beauty, and this is not a word we often associate with him, is that he is the most committed good jockey ever.

The man's Cheltenham Festival record evidences part of this, because that is where he is exposed. There is no right to win there because the usually omnipotent beasts of his omnipotent trainer collide with the best horses they will face all season.

And McCoy himself has often struggled against the combined might of the best pilots of Britain and Ireland.

In fact, in the course of defeat he is the most bad- tempered of jockeys around. He finds the urge to congratulate another winner most unnatural. He is, in fact, a bad sport.

This is, though, what makes the package. Out of the saddle, McCoy is the most generous of men with his time, one who makes his property in the Oxfordshire village of Kingston Lisle a spreading open house to his riding colleagues.

He would quite happily give them a 10-by-8 room for the night, but if they tried to pinch just a horsewidth up the inner the following day, we would be approaching the outskirts of Armageddon. The clue is in the name. McCoy is in Hilltop House and that is where he aims to stay.

At the racecourse, McCoy has no friends apart from the next horse. In this respect he dovetails most perfectly with Martin Pipe, a man of similar attitude. It is most telling that McCoy has been with Pipe for longer than any other jockey, that he has withstood the pressures put on him by the master of Pond House in return for a mound of winners.

For while Tony McCoy may have bad Cheltenhams, he does not have bad follow-ups. While others may be crashing together flagons and explaining how they did it in the Cotswolds, McCoy will be out there struggling on. Wins themselves are no comfort, rather a confirmation he has, for the moment, got something right.

In an interview with The Independent pre-Cheltenham recently, McCoy affirmed that he did seriously enjoy winning and would attempt to convey this sensation in future. It must be the most subtle of nuances the man is now using.

It was a weekend when there was victory for another hardy annual, Florida Pearl, a horse who tends to be portrayed as a failure despite his trove of successes.

The now 12-year-old had another piece of treasure to drop into the chest yesterday when he powered home in the Normans Grove Chase at Fairyhouse. Richard Johnson travelled over for the ride and had his mount, who was reappearing after some time in injury dry dock, well positioned from the off, soon disputing the lead with the Ruby Walsh-ridden Rince Ri.

Although Knife Edge and the favourite, Rathgar Beau, briefly looked like threatening rounding for home, it was Johnson and Florida Pearl who kicked on to extend their lead approaching the last fence.

The veteran stayed on strongly in the closing stages to comfortably account for Rince Ri by two lengths, with Rathgar Beau a further seven lengths away in third.

"I'm just delighted," Willie Mullins, the trainer, said. "He jumped so well and Richard did not have to ask very much of him at all. The horse was really enjoying himself out there.

"He'll probably go for the Ascot Chase at the end of the month [31 January] but he's also entered in the Hennessy Gold Cup at Leopardstown [8 February]. I'd love to go to the Gold Cup at Cheltenham with him but it would be a hard race for him at his age."

FAIRYHOUSE

Going: Soft (Heavy in places)

2.00: 1. FLORIDA PEARL (R Johnson) 8-1; 2. Rince Ri 11-2; 3. Rathgar Beau 3-1 fav. 9 ran. won by 2 lengths, 7. (W P Mullins). Tote: £10.80; £3.10, £1.60, £1.20. Exacta: £81.50. CSF: £51.88. Trifecta: £20.40.