Peter Scudamore

Speaker 30:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

Speaker 30:08

The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen ninety four, and the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:29

My castaway this week is a sportsman. The son of a jockey, he resisted all attempts to be turned into an estate agent and followed in his father's footsteps. His determination and innate understanding of horses led him to one thousand six hundred and seventy eight national hunt victories and the title of champion jockey, a record eight times. Having broken nearly every bone in his body, he retired last year while still only thirty four, and now follows the horses as a journalist. Known throughout the racing fraternity as Scoo, he is Peter Scudamore. So if your parents had had their way, Peter, you'd have ended up in an estate agent's office, not in the saddle, would you?

Peter Scudamore1:07

If my mother had had her way, she uh even when I was going well, she used to when I came home for Sunday lunch, she used to ask me when I was going to get a proper job. But uh my father always said if he had his time over again he would do exactly the same.

Presenter1:19

But your mother tried really hard to dissuade you. Didn't she feed you up so you'd be too fat to be a job?

Peter Scudamore1:23

That's right. She used to uh give me plenty of uh good food, but by the time I got to a teenage I was cutting on what was happening and uh already then people were saying to me, Oh, you'll be too big to be a jockey so that um immediately you were fighting that you you wouldn't be and uh I used to cut back on my food.

Presenter1:40

But of course what what would have motivated your mother, I suppose, was fear for you, really, wasn't it? Fear that you would fall?

Peter Scudamore1:46

That's right. My father had a very bad injury. He rode as a jump jump jockey for sixteen years and what was ironic was that he had a fall on the flat. A horse clipped another horse's uh heels in front of him going round a bend and he went down and he smashed all his face up and he was left partially sighted in the one eye and obviously then that stopped him riding. I think he was about thirty four, nineteen sixty six it was. Obviously mother was aware of the dangers then and I think it was a lot more dangerous in those days. I think he started in about fifty one where the safety standards were a lot uh lower than they are now. When he first started riding they were just using cork helmets. They weren't having the fiberglass helmets that we have now.

Presenter2:25

Now he of course did something, and I know you're constantly reminded of this, that you didn't do two things. In fact, he won the Grand National once and he won the Cheltenham Gold Cup, and you've won many, many things, but neither of those. Did you ever see him, or were you too small to winning?

Peter Scudamore2:39

I wasn't born when he won the Gold Cup in 1957, but when he won the National in 1959 I was one year of age and I've seen the old videos of it since. It makes me very proud. The obvious question is would I like to have won them? Yes, obviously I'd like to have won them, but I always say to myself, I don't think it would have changed my life or anything like that. I'm very proud that it's in the family. You know, I was champion jockey and won a champion hurdle, he won the Gold Cup, King George VI chase and the Grand National. So between us we've done it all and we're very proud of each other I think.

Presenter3:11

Let's have your first record. What is it?

Peter Scudamore3:13

Uh Elton John, goodbye Yellow Brick Road.

Presenter3:15

And why do you want that?

Peter Scudamore3:16

I love all Elton John's music, but when I it's rather romantic really. I was r I remember when I first uh left home to go and work at a stables uh called David Nicholson, and I was also going to work in the estate agents at the same time. And uh romantically this was played on the way from home, leaving home for the final time.

Speaker 43:36

When I gonna come down

Speaker 43:41

Am I going to land?

Speaker 43:44

I should have stayed on the phone, I should've listened to my own mind.

Peter Scudamore3:49

Bye.

Speaker 43:52

And now you come home forever.

Speaker 43:56

Didn't sign up for you

Speaker 44:00

Not a prison for your friends to open Most Boys Too Young to be a singing.

Presenter4:07

Elton John and goodbye, Yellowbrick Road. What was the first horse or pony or four legged friend you ever rode then, Peter?

Peter Scudamore4:14

The first four-legged friend that I remember is a donkey. There's pictures of me. It sat on the f the back of this donkey in the farm yard at home. But the the pony that really got me going and r really whetted my appetite was a pony called Black Opal, which was a marvellous character. He would jump anything. He he was wonderful round the show rings and he was a just a perfect pony. I got tremendous confidence in horses through him.

Presenter4:38

But you'd have been under ten then would you

Peter Scudamore4:39

Yes, I would have been about eight, nine, ten. And their honesty and and and their bravery, I think, gets you. I mean, he would jump.

Presenter4:41

Yeah, yeah.

Peter Scudamore4:47

Quite extraordinary heights. I mean, he could barely put his head over the stable door. Yet, if you didn't close it, he would he wasn't nothing nasty about him. He hated to be in clothes, so he would jump out. And then at night, if you turned him out, he would jump out of his field, and you could hear him clopping down the g garden path to go and eat the carrots in the garden.

Presenter5:07

This was at home on a farm in Herefordshire.

Peter Scudamore5:09

That's right. We had a s I had a most perfect upbringing really because I mean I think you know Herefordshire or the the west uh of England, that part of the world is absolutely beautiful. It's a greenness that uh I don't think they're seen in many of the counties of England and uh it was just idealic.

Presenter5:26

Riding every day of your life.

Peter Scudamore5:28

Yes, riding or something to do with anim animals.

Peter Scudamore5:32

It was never an effort to ride, so I I can't really remember whether I rode every day until in in my teens and then w as I became conscious that I wanted to uh become a jockey, then I knew I had to ride every day.

Presenter5:45

But didn't you write an essay when you were really very small at school, I read somewhere, that said, If I were twenty I would already have been champion jockey five times, wasn't it?

Peter Scudamore5:53

Yes, I I s I did that, but I suppose y then you're you're conscious that people are are going to read it, aren't they? And and you you're half hoping, I think that's your dream then. And I I I can't ever remember of wanting to do anything else. I remember I used to walk along and if it was a stone, I'd pick up a stone and there'd be a post over there and I'd throw at the post and I'd say to myself, Now if I hit that post I'll win the Grand National or I'll be champion jockey or something. I would so yes, uh that that was always there but

Presenter6:17

How early on did you ride competitively?

Peter Scudamore6:20

I rode in shows and gymcarnas as soon as I I could walk basically, you know, on leading reins, but uh competitively in a point-to-point uh about sixteen or seventeen. Uh and I think I had a ride in an amateur flat race at about uh sixteen. The most strangest thing is is that it looks very easy, but uh when you jump off after the end of the race your legs just go to jelly and you you you literally have to hold onto your horse otherwise you fall off and you jump off. It's it's quite you know, you have to be fairly fit at any rate to do it.

Presenter6:50

And wh when was your first win?

Peter Scudamore6:52

The first win was a horse called Monty's Reward in a point of point and uh again that was a a great thrill. And then a horse called Under Rules Proper was a horse called Rolliat at Devon. I remember I suppose it was a different pressure on me because my father had had ridden and ridden very successfully. I I've I knew I needed to succeed and it was a great feeling to have ridden that first winner. I thought well if I I've never do anything else I've at least I've achieved something in it.

Presenter7:20

And is it at all possible to describe the feeling? I mean, is it excitement? Is it fear? Or is it a feeling of just doing what you believe you're here to do? What about its job? Psychology.

Peter Scudamore7:28

satisfaction. I r you really do feel you're just in your own little world, you've set out to achieve something. It's you know, it's fairly simple. You've got to gallop a horse round in a circle for two or three miles. But you've you've overcome those problems and you've you've achieved it. And that's that was always the kick to me. And from the first winner to the last, it was always the same reason.

Presenter7:48

Record number two.

Peter Scudamore7:50

Mott the Hoople and the Golden Age of Rock and Roll. I don't think uh many people would be very proud of choosing this one, but uh uh I grew up listening to these.

Speaker 48:12

Ah!

Speaker 48:13

Jump shopping, screaming for the frames out of window.

Speaker 48:19

Cheese for the genus, dresses for the dreamers. But

Presenter8:28

Mop the Hoople and the golden age of rock and roll. You turned professional in nineteen seventy nine and you had a lot of success with the trainers David Nicholson and Fred Winter. But it was really your partnership with a man you first rode for in nineteen eighty five, I think, that led to all your records, and he was little known at the time. His name was is Martin Pipe. Now can you tell me about that first race you rode for him?

Peter Scudamore8:51

I rode this horse Hieronymus at Haydock and in fact I didn't want to ride it, I'd wanted to ride something else in the race. And I rode this horse and it set off in front of very, very fast and I thought there's no way it'll keep going and it kept galloping all the way to the line. And I I got off and I said to Martin Pye, This is the fittest horse I've ever ridden, or the fittest horse I've ridden all season. Martin it dawned on him straight away that his horse is he then realised, I think, that he was doing something right and and I sort of followed him from then on because I had a lot of respect for for the way he was preparing horses.

Presenter9:26

But how was he doing that? Because that was something that was self-taught, wasn't it? It was a kind of trial and error. He'd arrived at a certain and rather unconventional way of trying to.

Peter Scudamore9:33

That's right. He gets horses very fit by being very kind to them and and people because he's he's training them over short distances, where the old fashioned method was to gallop them over a lot further, which is a lot obviously a lot more stressful on them, not um mentally but physically. If you're galloping a mile and a quarter steady, it's it's probably harder on your joints and etcetera than sprinting over over a short distance.

Presenter9:59

So how would you sum up the principle of of the way in which he trained, these short, stress-free gallops?

Peter Scudamore10:06

Yes, it's basically it's it's interval training, uh which you know the athletes do. They he this his horses can surf for a minute or two uh over four or five furlong, break, come down and do that three times uh in the mornings.

Presenter10:20

Hmm.

Presenter10:21

but also listening to the horse, keeping the horse happy.

Peter Scudamore10:24

Martin's horses are very happy because they s tend to do repetitive things. People try to put human emotions in animals and horses like to know that they're gonna wake up at seven o'clock, be fed at half past seven, they're gonna go on to the same gallop, come back in, be looked after by their lad, maybe have a swim swim in the afternoon, fed again at night and then go to sleep. Like you and I, we want something different to occupy our brain. If we did that every day uh we'd be bored. But a horse likes to be bored. He likes repetitive things because he feels confident in his surroundings.

Presenter10:52

He likes life to be predictable.

Peter Scudamore10:54

Nice live

Presenter10:55

And so, if you put his racing shoes on the night before, does he not have a good night's sleep because he knows he's going to race the next day? I mean, is that part of it?

Peter Scudamore11:02

I'm not sure if if you platted him the night before, if you some horses you bring the lorry into the uh yard and then yes, they'll sweat up and worry about it. Yes, I think it does uh get to them. Now I don't know the psychology of a horse, but uh they say a dog has no concept of time. You know, if you leave a dog in a room for two hours, he doesn't know whether he's been there two hours or three days. Uh so I'm not quite sure how a horse worries about a race if he has no concept of time, he doesn't know whether he ran yesterday or the or the or the day before, you know. So

Presenter11:30

But you still recognize, I mean, even though you don't want to indulge in anthropomorphism, you you still recognize that you have to relax a horse, that the horse can get over over keyed up.

Peter Scudamore11:42

Oh yes, I think that and that's your great talent. Yeah, the one great attributes of of a jockey is you know, everybody looks of a jockey as being vigorous on a horse. I think the greatest attribute of a of a jockey is to be able to sit still on a horse.

Presenter11:43

And that's your great talent, isn't it?

Presenter11:54

Next record.

Peter Scudamore11:55

Uh this is by James, it's called Laid and uh I in partnership with a friend of mine, Nigel Chris and Davis and we trained together in the Cotswolds and uh this is really our or the Yards theme song. We sing along to this at at any party that's uh that we can get to.

Speaker 412:16

Erica said not to see you no more. She said you're like a disease without any cure. She said I'm so obsessed that I'm becoming a bore. Oh no.

Speaker 412:29

Ah, yeah, think you're so pretty.

Presenter12:37

Made by James. Um we've talked about the the psychology of the horse. Let's talk about the psychology of the jockey. I mean, how keyed up do you get before a race?

Peter Scudamore12:46

Well, I suppose it's not very cool to say it, but I used to get very keyed up. I think different people have different ways of switching themselves on. Some jockeys, John Franken was perhaps the best jockey that I ever rode with, jumping. Now he could joke all the way through to the start of the race and then he would switch on. He had great power of concentration like that. Whereas I took the attitude that I would always want to be listening to what other people were saying, studying form, by having the race run to suit you, or trying to get the race to run to suit you. If if you're riding a two mile race and your horse only just gets the distance, well it's no use going off flat out and stopping a quarter of a mile short.

Presenter13:27

But these are the kind of tactics that you and Martin Pipe would have discussed ad infinitum beforehand if you have a lot of different things.

Peter Scudamore13:32

That's right, and every so exciting about every race is that every race is different and you're trying to make the best of the horse that you've you've got.

Presenter13:41

But how many times would you change the plan that you and Pipe had made beforehand?

Peter Scudamore13:45

I think the best way of describing it is at least to a tennis player, it's no use deciding how you're going to play that tennis shot until you actually see the ball coming at you. So it's no use me saying, well, I am definitely going to go out and jump off and be in front all the way round until I see what the other horses are going to do. If some other idiot is going to go off too fast at a seven furlong pace in a two mile race, well then I have to sit in behind him second or third at my two mile pace. Well you're in front, well you have a horse that is in front and will gallop in front, then it's obviously a lot easier because you don't have to weave your way through, you're not likely to get uh brought down by other horses. But some not all horses respond to that. Some horses you ride for their speed from behind and other horses just won't go in front for more than a couple of furlong. They they think they've won and that's enough.

Presenter14:34

But obviously it's a very interdependent business, you know, the relationship between the trainer and the jockey. Um at the end of the day, whose role do you think is more important?

Peter Scudamore14:45

The horse. The horse is ninety-nine percent of it and I th then it's got to be an idiot of a trainer, an idiot of a jockey to stop it stop it winning. Yeah, the trainer has a much larger input than a than a jockey. So let's let's put it at uh ninety five percent the horse, four percent the trainer. He's gotta get it fit and uh the jockey gets all the glory at the end of it. But I mean that's it it definitely is the best bit as long as you don't as long as you stay on it. Um it it's easy for me to say that now I've uh retired, but uh the falls are are a big drawback.

Presenter15:14

Record number four.

Peter Scudamore15:16

The Ode to Joy from Beethoven's Ninth Symphony.

Presenter15:19

Why do you want that?

Peter Scudamore15:20

I liked classical music on the way to the races. It used to calm my nerves and I learnt the piano a little bit at school and uh I love Beethoven.

Speaker 415:52

Yeah.

Speaker 416:02

Time sober, in the development of this thing that went by the rings.

Presenter16:22

The Ode to Joy from Beethoven's Symphony No. nine with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, conducted by Sir George Schulte. Let's talk about the Grand National Peter Scudemore. What makes it special for a jockey, do you think?

Peter Scudamore16:35

The National has that special ingredient of a little bit of luck and a good horse and everything coming right on the day and the big fences. And it's just the sense of achievement of jumping round the Grand National course. When you jump round there you have tremendous respect for the horse. And even now if you go out to somebody's field and they say, Well, that's old

Peter Scudamore16:55

So and so he jumped round the National in 1981 or something. You know, you you know, you want to go up and give him a pat and say, Well done, old boy, you know. Respect.

Presenter17:01

Respect.

Presenter17:03

But it again it must be terrifying there before the event. I mean, it always looks chaotic.

Peter Scudamore17:07

I think terrifying's the wrong word.

Peter Scudamore17:10

You are worried, but I I I think you're worried about the unknown. You're not quite sure what's gonna happen. You you're you're

Peter Scudamore17:16

testing your skills and you're testing the horse's skills. And I think that's that's the nervousness that used to get to me rather than just the worrying of being hurt. I've ridden in flat races as well and you know basically you're gonna be although you know accidents do happen you're pretty unlucky if you get hurt in a flat race. And I still had the same nerves before a flat race as I do before the Grand National because it's you're not quite sh you're wanting to do well, you're not quite sure how the cards are going to open up in front of you and you're not quite sure how you're going to play it.

Presenter17:32

Uh

Presenter17:44

But there's more chaos really, isn't there? I mean, you know, if even if the race does start before the grand'cause there are so many more riders than in an average hundreds and riders and and and when we see you all, you know, milling about and

Peter Scudamore17:52

Yeah, yeah.

Presenter17:56

You never quite know whether you've got a line up to start or whether you'll go back or whether you'll walk forward and look at a fa you know, that must be really a a very demanding time. You're never quite sure wh what's going to happen when.

Peter Scudamore18:10

That's so. And and but once the race gets underway, once you jump to circuit, then it becomes almost easier than a lot of other races. Because the fences are big and the distance is a long way, you're going slower. It's almost as if things slow down and the horses what we call come back on their hocks and and because the fences are so big they're looking what they're they're doubly concentrating the horses and they're jumping better. Whereas sometimes you go around some of the smaller tracks and you're flat out all the time and the same in a car, it's speed that gets you. And the national, as I say, you're slowed down, you have time to do things. So once the chaos is over, it can be a much bigger thrill and come to you a lot easier than in a normal race.

Presenter18:52

The closest you ever came to winning it was um in nineteen eighty five on Corbier, wasn't it? You came third.

Peter Scudamore18:58

That's right. I turned into the strait to jump the the uh second last and uh a friend of mine who had fallen uh

Peter Scudamore19:05

On the first circuit he was stood by the Ben and said, Oh, Aunt Skew, you'll win now I thought, Oh crikey, I'm gonna win the National and I rode to the second last as if my life depended on it and then all of a sudden I I could hear a horse coming to my girths and I looked, I thought, It must be a loose horse, must be a loose horse but it was a Phil Tuck on a horse and then uh halfway up the running a well a great friend of mine, Huel Davis, got up and won on last suspect.

Presenter19:28

Terribly disappointing.

Peter Scudamore19:29

Win, lose, or dry, never mind, as long as you do your best.

Presenter19:32

More music.

Peter Scudamore19:33

This is a a change of direction yet again. I'm a great fan of the Pogues. I like a lot of the Irish music, again this is the fairy tale of New York.

Speaker 419:42

It was Christmas Eve

Speaker 419:47

And the drum tank

Speaker 419:51

When old man said to me.

Speaker 419:55

Don't say another one.

Speaker 419:59

And then he sang a song.

Speaker 420:04

The Rare Old Matantio

Speaker 420:08

I turn my face away.

Speaker 420:12

The Poogues and Fair

Presenter20:12

Pogues and Fairy Tale of New York. I said that you've broken practically every bone in your body, some of them twice. Your nose was almost

Peter Scudamore20:20

Moving further across my face.

Presenter20:21

But you made some lightning recoveries as well because you once broke your leg. I think both bones in your leg were broken, and you were back in the saddle in in ten weeks. What's the secret?

Peter Scudamore20:32

My swiftness of recovery twice was because of a chap called John Webb who is a surgeon in Nottingham. And the first time that I had a really bad fall, he shows you what a coward I am, was at a race course called Southle, which is just outside Nottingham. It was about the time of the Falklands War and I had a kick on the head and I'd broken my arm and I was laying in this little tin shack which was the ambulance room in those days and a friend of mine, Steve Smith Eccles, came up to me. He said, Oh, are you all right? and I was in Cloud Cuckoo Land. I said, Steve, Steve, don't let them conscript me to the Falklands.

Peter Scudamore21:06

Anyway, they they got me round and they s sent me off to a hospital and I was sat in this hospital with uh with this broken arm and they got a big air splint on my arm and uh I was sat in my breeches and boots and this gentleman came up to me. He said, Now look if you can pull yourself together He said, You come in my car, I can take you round to my operating theatre and he said I'll have you right in in no time and he duly operated on me and I woke up in the morning and there was no plaster on my arm, he'd put two plates in the arm.

Peter Scudamore21:32

And straight away he wanted me moving this arm and I I recovered very, very quickly from it and I was able to ride again quickly next season. But he said to me, If you ever get hurt again, there's my number, come back to me. And I, poor man, he must regret having said that because I broke my leg at Market Raisin. The horse fell and you get again I'm not, as I said, I've already pointed out, I hate pain and I'm not a brave man, but you get used to these injuries and I went to stand up. The pain hadn't come. I went to stand up and I realized my leg would broken. You just feel it. It's a horrible feeling.

Peter Scudamore22:06

And you realise you're broken. So I sat down again and uh I'd already broken a leg and the worst thing about it is with these type racing boots on is when they try to take the boot off. So I took my boot off before the pain came and I shouted to the ambulance people to

Presenter22:17

Mm.

Peter Scudamore22:23

I've broken my leg, because I the other next thing of pain is when the ambulance people come along and prod you and poke you to to find out where it hurts. And I knew where it was going to hurt, so they got me some oxygen, they took me into the ambulance room, and I said, you know, get me to to John Webb. Get me to Nottingham. Get me to Nottingham and they eventually got me down to Nottingham.

Presenter22:37

Get me to Nottingham.

Peter Scudamore22:41

And it was late at night by the time I got there. And when I got there, he was in his Dickie Bow. And he said, my wife's not very pleased with you. He said, I was just about to go out for a dinner. And anyway, he said, he looked at my leg. He said, well, I can put you in plaster for 16 weeks, or I can put a plate in your leg, and I'll have you back in the saddle in 10. And he put the plate in my leg, and within a week or so, I was swimming. And within 10 weeks, I'd broken it in two places. And within 10 weeks, I was back riding. What I liked about him is that he keeps pushing you not to whereas a lot of people say, don't do that, don't do that. So you keep doing that. And he keeps saying, well, go on, you know, go a little bit further, go and then they go, oh, I can't, it hurts. So you push yourself. I was very frightened when he said, right, you can go and ride now after 10 weeks. I thought, you know, are you sure that it's knitted back together again? I don't want it all to happen again. So.

Presenter23:07

He's a miracle man.

Peter Scudamore23:32

I had to have you have mentally again you have to come back and have a fall and realize that you're all alright before you go again.

Presenter23:38

Number six.

Peter Scudamore23:40

This is from Rossini's Barbara Seville and this is the sort of song you can sing in the bath.

Presenter23:45

Is it the song you sing in the bar?

Peter Scudamore23:47

Uh when I can remember the words.

Presenter23:49

Uh

Speaker 423:49

Lord of the autumn de la chickal

Speaker 423:57

Restaurant job. Rest of the menu.

Speaker 424:02

La la la la la la la la la la la la la la la

Speaker 424:06

Ah, Kevel Viber, Kevel Piat, Kebel Piotr, Fernberger. Dickolita, Dicolita.

Speaker 424:39

For do not defeat

Presenter24:48

Tito Gobbi singing Lago al factotum from Rossini's Barber of Seville with the Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by Alceo Galliera.

Presenter24:56

You'd always said, Peter Scudamore, that you would know when it was time to go, and

Presenter25:01

How did you know when you went, which was at the end of last season, you decided to retire very suddenly, it seemed? Wha what was the writing you saw on the wall?

Peter Scudamore25:09

It had a fantastic run.

Peter Scudamore25:11

And the way I put it is that steeple chasing is a culcu you're either a complete idiot and you say I'm going to do it at all costs and I'll never get hurt or you say well you know quite honestly you will get hurt one day and you take your chances, you take a calculated risk and I felt I pushed my luck and I thought well you know give yourself you know give luck a chance and get out a little bit earlier. Plus I had the financial incentive to do it. We have a jockers association which set up a pension fund which we can claim a pension at thirty-five and I was going to get some sort of money then and I thought to myself I've got to make a living when I retire from it sometimes and you know whether I do it ten years time or one year's time or whatever, at least I've got a little bit behind of me to go and have a a crack at it.

Presenter25:56

So it wasn't partly the case, as some of the commentators seem to suggest, that you perhaps sensed you were beginning to lose your nerve. You weren't quite as brave. Some of them suggested at a meeting at Utoxeter I think you'd been to quite as brave as you

Peter Scudamore26:13

I didn't have to do it anymore. That was the hunger. If if you said...

Presenter26:17

So you lose the winning instance.

Peter Scudamore26:18

Yes, I think if you took everything away from me now and said, Look, you've got to go out and do it again, I could quite happily go out and do it, but I all of a sudden the hunger had gone. I didn't want to pack up on the National. I knew about the time of the National I was going to do it, but I didn't want to put the pressure on myself to say if I won, gave up. And I thought, well, I'll wait till after the National. And it would you know the National going wrong had absolutely nothing to do with it and just that ask on that day was a perfect day to go out'cause I had rides for Martin Pipe and my great pal Nigel Puss and Davis. So it all worked out well and I could get out on rides for them.

Presenter26:55

You've got out on a winner.

Peter Scudamore26:56

And I got out in the winter and I had a few months to go and get some jobs. I'm lucky, you know, the Daily Mail gave me a job and I worked for the BBC.

Presenter27:04

Was it a decision that was greeted with enormous relief by your family, by your wife, in particular, Marilyn?

Peter Scudamore27:10

I think so. I think Marilyn and the kids were Michael, my youngest child, didn't in those days like racing, so he it didn't really bother him whether I gave up or not. Uh Thomas was quite upset about it, I think, because I you know, there was a lot of press coverage of me through the years, so you know, he enjoyed that, I mean, as much as we all did.

Presenter27:31

And do they, Michael and Thomas, want to be jockeys?

Peter Scudamore27:33

And will you

Presenter27:34

And will you let them if they do?

Peter Scudamore27:36

to them. I I mean, I hope they'd make their living from a sport. I think it's the most wonderful way of making a living.

Presenter27:41

Record number seven.

Peter Scudamore27:43

A little bit of a change of uh tact again from the Barbara Seville to Bruce Springsteen and Cadillac Ranch.

Speaker 427:52

When those in that black trans hat are gonna me damn

Speaker 428:05

Tiny and bro

Presenter28:22

Bruce Springsteen and Cadillac Ranch. Um if, as it's been said, you're a natural eleven stoner who struggled to keep his weight at what about nine stone eleven, I should think the relief is enormous retiring, isn't it?

Peter Scudamore28:36

No, it isn't, you know. I love the great thing about being a sponsor I think you feel so well in yourself for being fit and the

Peter Scudamore28:42

The way we diet was healthy eating, and now I don't do as much exercise, so you almost have to even eat less. I

Presenter28:49

But how much weight have you put on since you returned?

Peter Scudamore28:51

Probably a stone, you know.

Presenter28:53

So you are nearer eleven now.

Peter Scudamore28:54

Yeah, some about ten, twelve, ten, thirteen now.

Presenter28:57

Yeah, do you still hop on the scales or whatever?

Peter Scudamore28:59

I do now and again, yes. When I was riding I could look at my you know, I could feel you could feel how heavy you were because you were so conscious I mean, each pound it's not for vanity's sake, makes a difference, because you were trying to do ten stone, you knew you had to be nine stone nine, your body weight had to be nine stone nine to pass the scales at ten stone with the saddle and the colours and whatever else you you had. So uh

Speaker 429:16

Yeah.

Presenter29:16

Yeah.

Peter Scudamore29:20

The hardest thing was when you were dehydrating yourself to be cut down, but food wasn't has never been a you know, I guess I get hungry and things, but it's never been something that I've really lived for. I think the hardest thing was that it's very hard to relax without food and especially drink. Not necessarily alcohol, but it was liquid that you were trying to keep out of yourself as much as possible. And when you've finished um race riding, the social side comes. You go into a social arena and and not eat or drink. It's it's impossible, you know, and I didn't smoke either. So you you sort of what do you do with your hands? You you get fed up talking to people. You know, you you're not concentrating on what people are saying to you'cause you're you're looking at what they're eating and and drinking.

Speaker 429:26

Yeah.

Presenter29:26

Yeah.

Presenter30:00

And you can't take part in the normal social activity, but they are, so you feel like another person.

Peter Scudamore30:03

So really you were better off going to bed early and then people called you miserable and unsociable, so you couldn't wait.

Presenter30:11

And what do they call you now?

Peter Scudamore30:12

People say, Oh, I was surprised that, you know, he was out partying late last night or something

Presenter30:17

And uh and now you're a trainer. Now you're training in exactly the same style as Martin Pipe, exactly the same kind of system.

Peter Scudamore30:25

As I said, the worry of

Peter Scudamore30:27

Being a national hunt jockeys that you're always going to have to pack up fairly early in the career. Well, as a flat race jockeys, they don't have the falls, so they can go on till they're, you know, I think Willie Carson's 51 or 2, Leicester's Lester's nearly 60 odd, isn't he? Whereas the falls stop us from carrying on much later than 40, maximum, I suppose. So I'd always.

Presenter30:36

Yeah.

Peter Scudamore30:47

prepared for the day I gave up. Luckily the friend of mine, Nigel Twisten Davis, had bought a farm in the Cotswolds and he offered me a chance of buying half of it. And I bought half the farm for a rainy day and he set up training or we set up training together.

Presenter31:01

And you're already having great success.

Peter Scudamore31:03

Things have been going very well. It's not quite the same thrill as as riding a winner, as training a winner, but I I do get a a great kick out of it.

Presenter31:11

Last record.

Peter Scudamore31:12

Well, I suppose everybody who uh likes pop music has these amongst their uh collection and uh I think there's nothing nicer to at the end of a day to sit down uh with the lights off, uh with a glass of wine or a glass of beer in your hand and listen to Let It Be.

Speaker 431:42

I find myself in times of trouble, Mother Mary comes to me, Speaking words of wisdom, let it be

Presenter31:55

The Beatles and Let It Be. So if you could only take one of those records, Peter.

Peter Scudamore32:00

Laid by James. It's a celebration song to me.

Presenter32:03

So when you're miserable on your desert island you'll be able to lift yourself out of it. What about your book?

Peter Scudamore32:08

I'll take uh Book of Verse by Ruddyard Kipling. Where again when I get very drunk I ask anybody back to my house who will listen to me read a poem by

Presenter32:18

Rediff.

Peter Scudamore32:18

Read if to them, yes. And I love England is a garden as well.

Presenter32:23

And what about your luxury?

Peter Scudamore32:24

Uh I'm gonna take snorkeling equipment, I think, and I can swim around the coral reef to my delight.

Presenter32:32

Peter Scudmore, thank you very much indeed for letting us hear your desert island discs.

Speaker 332:43

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.