By Will Lefebve

 

Lewis Carroll will forever be remembered by those of a certain age, particularly English history and literature students, as a Guildford-born author, poet, mathematician, photographer and Anglican priest.

“What’s this luminary got to do with horse racing” I hear.

Yes, he was the intellectual who nearly 160 years ago famously penned Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland and its sequel Through The Looking Glass, followed by those nonsense offerings Jabberwocky and The Hunting Of The Snark.

Well, here’s the gist. Ronnie (singer), Declan (horse trainer), John (jockey) and Roy (goalkeeper) are four other well-known Carrolls, but the guy with that surname most familiar to Brighton turf diehards over the past 15 years is unquestionably the universally-liked and Lambourn-born Tony.

No relation to Lewis, I believe, but someone for whom ‘Wonderland’ aptly sums up Tony’s “second home” by the seaside, the scenic “switchback horseshoe-shaped track” overlooking the English Channel high above Whitehawk Hill and Roedean School. I wonder if he uses a “looking-glass” as he trawls through the weekly bible known as the Racing Calendar in search of opportunities for his string of almost 100 horses?

Tony is such a major player nowadays down here in BN2 that his regular long distance raiders from far off Cropthorne, near Pershore, Worcs (WR10) - an area most associated with apples and orchards - have earned their trainer legendary status.

The Freshfield Road venue has accommodated a remarkable 428 Carroll runners since 2019 alone, yielding 48 winners, and to quote gifted scribe David Ashforth from a recent Racing Post column: “If only Brighton paid appearance money!”

His very first Brighton runner as a trainer was Mac’s Dream (Michael Tebbutt up), seventh of 15 on May 4, 1999 in a £3,184-50 six furlongs maiden handicap, in which the other trainers still in the business today were Gary Moore, John Bridger, George Margarson, John Gosden and Rae Guest.

Tony had to wait 11 years to celebrate that first training success at Brighton, with one of his favourite horses, King Olav.

I suppose it had to be a coincidence that Brighton was the venue where Tony’s racing career got off the ground as a young apprentice having only his second career mount, 37 years before King Olav’s success, and six days before Morston’s famous Epsom Derby triumph.

A.Carroll, claiming 5lb on his boss Pat Taylor’s bay filly Quite Sweet, comfortably saw off six other “kids” including David Holley, to land a gamble in the £399 Glynde Apprentice Handicap, and that was to be the first of 254 wins in the saddle before he switched to training in the mid-90s.

Ask Tony to explain how Brighton racecourse has become an essential part of his life, and he’ll tell you it has been a genuinely natural, thoroughly enjoyable and rewarding, unplanned path to seaside splendour.

“I suppose we’ve created our own mini-Goodwood down here because our horses invariably run well at Brighton. Most of the string are not Goodwood standard, but Brighton suits most of them, and these occasions are magical for everyone associated with the yard. It’s like a little Festival for us”, says the 67-year-old.

“My owners and I love the place, they encourage us to run here, and we’ve had a stack of winners. I don’t know exactly how many we’ll run, or how many owners in total will be on the course, but most of them are staying in Brighton all week. I know for instance that ten of the boys are flying over from Ireland.”

They won’t all be descending on East Sussex, but 34 different Tony Carroll horses appear in the five-day entries, making up 52 of the 302 in total for the 18 races over the three days of the Festival this week.

It would be impossible to mention all the 117 Carroll winners at Brighton since King Olav broke the ice, but one in particular demands a headline – Pour La Victoire.

This now-retired 14-year-old gelding ran 121 times in a ten-year career, 36 of those races at Brighton.

He won 17 times (11 at Brighton), finished in the first three 54 times, earned £111,802.

He competed at 20 different tracks as far apart as Ayr and Goodwood, was partnered by 38 jockeys including three champions and, when he bowed out on a winning note three years ago this week, the Brighton management promptly renamed their winning connections room the Pour La Victoire Suite.

Finally, since Tony broke his duck as a trainer at Windsor with 25-1 Queen Of Shannon in August, 1996, he has sent 16,212 runners to the races, bagging a win total under both codes of 1,390. To quote Michael Parkinson: “Remarkable!”.

Now in sight of his long-held ambition to complete a maiden “calendar century” - his best yet is 85 in 2022 - Tony goes into battle at the Festival on 71.

Don’t bet against another productive week for his Worcestershire warriors.