Iconic Festival Moments: Michael Dickinson’s ‘Famous Five’

“I wish people would realize what a hell of an achievement it is for anyone to bring a horse to Cheltenham that is fit enough to run well in the Gold Cup. Every year the horses fall out of the ante post bets and getting here, let alone winning the race, often seems almost impossible.’

Michael Dickinson speaking after Bregawn’s victory in a legendary 1983 Cheltenham Gold Cup Chasers & Hurdlers described as an edition “that might well join the handful of horseracing that rank among the greatest sporting moments of our time”. The trainer might have thought that getting just one horse to run well in the Gold Cup would be an achievement in itself, but Dickinson had five in the running, with Bregawn being followed by his stablemates Captain John, Wayward Lad, Silver Buck and after Home was followed by Ashley Home. “That has to be doubted,” he said Chasers & Hurdlers‘whether the annals of turf deliver a more amazing training triumph than that of Michael Dickinson when he saddled the top five in the recognized Steeplechase Steeple Championship.’

It remains a unique feat in Gold Cup history, although Paul Nicholls saddled the top three in 2008 as Denman defeated Kauto Star and Neptune Collonges, while a year later when Kauto Star turned the tables on Denman, Nicholls held four of the top five at home had, with Neptune Collonges and My Will taking fourth and fifth place respectively.

Bregawn, ridden by Graham Bradley, looked the pick of the Dickinson quintet and was sent off by the 100/30 favorite after showing improved form since finishing second to Silver Buck in last season’s Gold Cup. He had won four races before Cheltenham in 1982/83, most notably beating Captain John at the Hennessy Gold Cup at Newbury after recently recovering from a nasty mistake. Bregawn ended his Gold Cup preparation with a win in a limited handicap at Hereford on which no bets were returned.

Silver Buck, the eldest member of the quintet, had also won four times before defending his Gold Cup title, including when he gave weight to a future Gold Cup winner, Burrough Hill Lad, beating him when he played the Edward Hanmer Memorial Chase in Haydock won for the fourth time. Like Bregawn, Silver Buck was an easy task for his last run before Cheltenham in a handicap at Market Rasen, but Dickinson had expressed doubts about Silver Buck’s fitness in the run-up to the Gold Cup, which resulted in him losing favor with Bregawn.

Wayward Lad had also given his coach a headache in his Gold Cup preparation – hence Dickinson’s quote above – and his participation hung in the balance until days before the race. Lameness in an ankle in February had cut short his training and he went to the Gold Cup without a heat since winning the first of his three King George VI chases with Silver Buck (favorite to win a third King George of his own). ) third again. Incidentally, Wayward Lad’s Boxing Day win made him part of another record-breaking performance by his coach this season, as he was one of the “Dickinson dozens”, the stable that sent out twelve winners from 21 runners that day.

Hennessy’s runner-up, Captain John, was new to the stable this season and became an all-round improved performer for Dickinson, including in the jumping department. His biggest win came after the Hennessy when he won the SGB Handicap Chase at Ascot, but he too had to heal over the winter from an injury sustained fourth at the Welsh Grand National. Captain John was another who went to the Gold Cup after winning in much lesser company, in his case an amateur drivers race at Kelso.

That made improving handicapper Ashley House the most expensive of Poplar House’s five runners. Despite having won four of his last five starts before the Gold Cup, including victories at Haydock in the Grand National Trial and the Peter Marsh, Dickinson didn’t think Ashley House was good enough for Cheltenham, rightly so as it turned out, and was in favour to wait for the Grand National instead. However, due to his owner’s love of running, Ashley House joined his stablemates in the Gold Cup field where he played a small but crucial role in his stable’s performance.

Despite his strong hand – alongside favorite Bregawn, Silver Buck and Wayward Lad featured prominently in the betting at 5/1 and 6/1 respectively – it was far from a formality that the Dickinson five would dominate so heavily up front, like they did. The three other runners from the northern stables – Richdee, Midnight Love and Whiggie Geo – were all underdogs, but there remained 9/2 second favorite Combs Ditch, coached by David Elsworth, and Fred Winter pair Fifty Dollars More and Brown Chamberlin , the latter pair ahead of Captain John and Ashley House in the bets as credible contenders. The much-improved Combs Ditch had won his last three races before the Gold Cup, including beating a ring-rusty Bregawn in the Jim Ford Challenge Cup at Wincanton during Fifty Dollars More, to whose victories the Mackeson Gold Cup at Cheltenham and the Timeform Chase Haydock had suffered his only loss of the season when he shared Wayward Lad and Silver Buck at the King George.

While the 1983 Gold Cup will be remembered as a triumph for the Dickinson team, as a horse race it was actually a remarkably one-sided competition. Bregawn shrugged off the attention of rank outsider Whiggie Geo early on and from then had a clear lead as he set a searching canter much of the way and it was only really on the run to the penultimate that Wayward Lad (ridden by Jonjo O’Neill), Silver Buck (Robert Earnshaw) and Captain John (David Goulding) had all closed down to pose a threat while the rest were all knocked off. A tired Silver Buck missed every remaining chance he might have had at the last where Captain John and Wayward Lad still had every chance, but Bregawn pulled back up the hill to win by five lengths and a half.

For some reason it was clear that barring accidents, Dickinson would have at least the top four at home. Silver Buck eventually finished a gap behind Wayward Lad in fourth place, while Ashley House, who had chased Bregawn early on in the second loop before falling behind, managed to edge the remaining stragglers by another 25 lengths for the all-important fifth place drive out. Combs Ditch was placed well enough to spoil the party in the last ditch (where Fifty Dollars More fell as he struggled), but he surrendered to make it home as the last of the eight to finish.

The Cheltenham stewards allowed all five Dickinson runners to unsaddle themselves in the winner’s pen, normally reserved for the top four only. Another rather surprising footnote to the 1983 Gold Cup was that Bregawn was the first all-time favorite to win since Arkle in 1966.

A final important point about Dickinson’s performance was that it was all the more remarkable for coming at a time when the largest show jumping stables were not of the size they are today. His yard was also home to Badsworth Boy, who won the first of his three Queen Mother Champion Chases by a wide margin (which remains a unique feat) 24 hours before the Gold Cup, a feat that made him Timeform’s Champion Jumper of the season. The records Dickinson set in the 1982-83 season for number of wins and amount of prize money won may not hold anymore, but his achievement of saddled the top five in the Gold Cup seems to be for a while yet to have stock.

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