'Everyone was asking how I stayed on - it was the fear of another bollocking from The Duke!'
Four-time champion Richard Johnson takes Lewis Porteous on a fascinating journey through the key horses in his career
![The 4 times Champion jump jockey Richard Johnson holds onto a cushion stating that fact Leominster 10.4.23 Pic: Edward Whitaker](/_next/image/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fs3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com%2Fprod-media-racingpost%2Fprod%2Fimages%2F169_1008%2Ffd126e0110e5-horse-racing-richard-johnson-and-cushion.jpg&w=3840&q=75)
When Richard Johnson started out in the saddle, his ambitions were rather modest. There were no outlandish dreams or grand plans, he just wanted to quench his thirst to ride competitively. The thought of mixing it in points was enough to set his pulse racing.
So when Space Mariner got him off the mark at the age of 16 at the now defunct Brampton Bryan point-to-point on April 9, 1994, no-one could have foreseen the 3,819 winners under rules in Britain and Ireland that would follow over the next 27 years.
Johnson was a farmer’s boy, his roots set deep in the Herefordshire soil, but he was also a third-generation jockey following his grandfather Ivor and father Keith. And just three weeks after Space Mariner's success, he knocked off the first of those winners under rules on a horse as much a part of the family as he himself was.
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Published on inThe Horses Who Made Me
Last updated
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