sport news The real AP McCoy at 50! Legendary jockey shares tales of fortune tellers, ... trends now
The numbers and anecdotes that will boggle your mind will arrive in due course but first Sir Anthony McCoy wants to explain his apprehension.
A landmark birthday is approaching – he'll be 50 next Saturday – and saying the number out loud leads to a grimace. In his head, he feels no different to the young man from Moneyglass in County Antrim who arrived on these shores aged 20 in August 1994, driving 'my little Peugeot 205' into Toby Balding's yard burning with dreams and desire.
McCoy could control almost everything in his life, from championship races to the kind of pain that would make most of us faint, but not the ageing process. Nor will he be able to shape events at the Tottenham Stadium this afternoon, something that will leave this Arsenal devotee tormented.
'Sitting on a horse at Cheltenham? No problem,' McCoy begins. 'Sitting watching a match?'
He doesn't need to finish the sentence, the raised eyebrows and wry smile says enough.
AP McCoy will turn 50 next Saturday and admitted he was 'disappointed' by his age
McCoy spoke exclusively to Mail Sport's Dominic King ahead of his 50th birthday
One of the greatest jockeys in history, McCoy won the Cheltenham Gold Cup in 2012 (above)
'One of my proudest possessions is a signed shirt from The Invincibles squad that Ray Parlour got me for my 30th birthday,' he continues. 'It says "McCoy 30" and I've got it up in my games room, next to a signed shirt Steve McManaman gave to me after Real Madrid won the Champions League.
'Now I'm going to be 50… Jeez, that's disappointing. But then again, I look at my dear friend Pat Smullen, who died at 43. Maybe getting to 50 really is a privilege. Time plays tricks on you, doesn't it? 20 years seems like five minutes ago.'
And it feels like only yesterday the greatest of all time – who rode a scarcely believable 4358 winners during an unbroken two decade reign as Champion Jump Jockey – took his final ride at Sandown but here we are, nine years on. Retirement put a hole in his life that remains.
'If you are lucky enough to ever have performed on a big stage, nothing can replace it,' he says.
'Any sportsman will tell you that. The top ones, Tiger Woods and others, genuinely believe people go to see them. It's the greatest privilege of all time. You are out there and you know: "this is the dream".'
This is a fitting way to take us into the next story.
'I've never told anyone this,' McCoy begins. 'This is really eerie. I went to a fortune teller, one night after Wexford races in 1991. I'd never been to a fortune teller in my life. I went there with a lad called Connor Everard, we worked together as apprentices at Jim Bolger's.
'I go into the caravan, this gypsy didn't have a clue who I was or have any idea what I did. She says to me: "I see horses and big events, you're going to be involved in them. It might take time but there is a jockey called Lester Piggott. You are going to be like him." I swear on my life.
Two years earlier, McCoy triumphed in the Grand National riding Don't Push It
The Northern Irishman was a Champion Jockey a record 20 consecutive times in his career
Following his retirement, McCoy transitioned from the paddock to the TV as an analyst for ITV
McCoy is a regular figure on ITV's coverage at Cheltenham and the Grand National
'I remember coming out and Conor asking me: "what did she say?" I said: "Oh, something about horses." Listen – I'm not for one minute saying I'm like Lester Piggott. I had three-and-a-half years in Jim's after that and rode nine winners. But that's the truth.'
Talk about seeing into the future. McCoy's career, though, owed nothing to fortune and even in this limited window, you begin to understand how his mind works and his forensic obsession to detail. Starting in 1996, he wrote reports – which he still has in his loft at home – on every horse he rode.
He constantly goes into the calendar on his phone and scrolls through the Racing Post app to ensure dates and information he provides are correct, such as the events of February 21, 2003 at Kempton Park when McCoy graphically explains the lengths he would go to for success.
'I'd fallen off a horse called Neutron in the first race,' he says. 'I remember hitting the ground and thinking: "Oh my ****ing God! That is sore." I looked over and the racecourse doctor was by the hurdle. "Are you ok?" he asked. "Yeah, yeah. I'm fine." I said. I wasn't.
'I knew my collarbone was gone. But I thought I had three or four certainties to come and I couldn't let anyone else ride them, so I took some painkillers. The first one got beat but the next three won. People think I'm a nut job when I talk like this but it's the truth.'
For the record, he broke his middle and lower vertebrae; both shoulder blades and collarbones; ribs, an ankle, cheekbones, his wrist, ankle, fingers, nose and leg plus a dislocated thumb and chipped teeth. He lifts up his sleeve to show to show a scar that runs from his wrist to his elbow.
'I broke my arm at Worcester in June 2003,' he goes on. 'I got compartment syndrome, Tiger Woods had it after his car crash. It's an
