To be frank

Towards the end of the flat season, I confess I drifted away from the racing coverage. Partially this was due to a couple of insane months of work, travel and illness. But a larger part the reality that I got tired of the relentless Frankie Dettori coverage.

Dettori has been racing for my entire lifetime, a name I grew up knowing even though I was brought up in the world of National Hunt. It cannot and should not be denied that he has done a huge service to the racing industry in terms of publicity and profile, and the enthusiasm he whips up among crowds is incomparable. You just need to listen to the cheers and watch people run to see the flying dismount to know he courts universal popularity. At a time when racing is under so much scrutiny and engagement is required, Dettori should of course be lauded for his immense contribution to the sport.

It’s therefore absolutely natural that his ‘retirement tour’ should have been a celebration of his decades riding and winning. It was perhaps slightly over-the-top that he had an entire season on said tour: most sportspeople tend to retire fairly quietly and several well-known jockeys in recent years have announced their last ride after the fact. Nonetheless, Dettori is a showman so can be forgiven for riding out the season in glory.

Except that it wasn’t a retirement tour, as we discovered only just before it was due to end. In October, Dettori announced that he would not be riding again on this side of the Atlantic – but that he had decided to continue his career in the US. Of course, if he is riding for US trainers, this also doesn’t preclude the possibility that he will in fact be sent back for Royal Ascot or similar.

While most observers had been seeing the signs of a possible backtrack in a lot of ‘never say never’s and ‘we’ll see’s, unfortunately the media didn’t seem to get the memo. Between the races themselves and on the front pages of the industry papers, the coverage has been wall-to-wall ‘Frankie’s last…’. It’s a shame that they completely missed the mark in finding a balance, and what should have been a glorious celebration of the sport as a whole has become slightly nauseating and rather absurd.

For those who tune in to follow the horses there has been a distinct lack of comparative four-legged interest, while the many goodbyes to Dettori have started to sound more and more hollow.

I’ve never been more grateful for the return to coverage of the jumps. Let’s get back to the horses – who, after all, are the real stars of the show.