The day farmer Fred nearly took the shine off Istabraq

In the pantheon of great hurdlers, the Aidan O’Brien-trained Istabraq is right up there. Meet the Warwickshire farmer who almost put a dent in that brilliant horse’s Cheltenham record before it had begun.

This article first appeared in the Racing Post on Friday 2nd February.

Fred Hutsby was a teenage amateur when Mighty Moss rolled into his parish, a horse bought by his dad Ken a year after a family tragedy.

Point-to-pointing has been stitched into Hutsby life for generations, certainly back to Fred’s great-grandfather Fred, and it has been handed down to his son Tom, 16, (left, with Fred) who started in points this season.

Turn time back to 1997 and there was Fred and six-year-old Mighty Moss lining up at the Cheltenham Festival, not in the Foxhunters’ Chase, which would have been an achievement in itself, but in the 17-runner Royal Sun Alliance (now Ballymore) Novices’ Hurdle. Imagine it, a point-to-point rider aged 19 partnering his dad’s horse and taking on the cream of jockeys and potential Champion or Stayers’ Hurdle winners.

They did not win, but they led from the fourth flight, rallied when Istabraq under Charlie Swan passed them going to the final hurdle and were just a length behind at the line.

It remains an example of a genuine amateur excelling among the best of the pros, for Richard Hughes finished third and Richard Johnson fourth. Istabraq went on to win three Champion Hurdles, while Mighty Moss, who one year earlier had finished third under Hutsby in the Champion Bumper, subsequently took fourth place in the Stayers’ Hurdle and fifth in the Foxhunters’ Chase.

Fred says: “I rode once at 16, once at 17 and five or six times at 18, so Tom has had a helluva start by comparison. Hopefully he will make a jockey – it’s what he wants to do. He plans to go to agricultural college later this year, but I hope in time he is good enough to ride for other people and we won’t need to have so many horses.”

As is the way of things in the horse world, Mighty Moss was not planned. Fred says: “Dad was in Ireland, staying with Brian Murphy at the Dunraven Arms and looking for a hunter for my sister when he saw Mighty Moss. He bought him for two and a half grand [Irish punts].

“I was a stable lad at David Nicholson’s so the horse went there. It was a great time, with the likes of Richard Johnson, Warren Greatrex and Richard Burton working there, and I’m still friends with all of them. I learned a lot. Mighty Moss wasn’t a fast horse, but he had such a cruising speed and the first time he ran he hosed up in a Huntingdon bumper.

“I was young, and if he’d come along when I had more experience, things would have been different. In the Istabraq race they went so fast they ran wide on the first bend, I went up the inner and found myself in front and he became really lit up. He pulled and pulled, but if I had dropped my hands and relaxed on him we might have won.”

Despite knee issues, Mighty Moss raced until he was 12, eventually becoming a potent hunter chaser and a wonderful focus for the family following the death of Fred’s brother Ryan in a farm accident.

“Tom’s a far better rider than me,” says Fred, “but I rode 94 winners, so he has a long way to go to catch me. I had some brilliant times riding.”