On Thursday I went to one of the most uplifting sports events I have attended in a long time.
It took place in a small English town of perhaps 12,000 people with Roman origins. Its apogee came when the sport’s supreme champion of modern times, aged 39, set a benchmark for sustained excellence and endurance on a par with Australian cricketer Don Bradman’s 99.94 Test match batting average, or US swimmer Michael Phelps’s 22 Olympic medals, or, yes, Pelé’s 1,281 goals.
The event was the horseracing meeting at which A.P,McCoy, at around 3.15pm, rode the 4,000th winner of his career. (No other jump-jockey has reached even 3,000 winners.)