‘It can get pretty brutal’ – Mark Johnston reveals the abuse Britain’s top trainers really face and why he was shocked to find he wasn’t alone
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Mark Johnston has reflected on the abuse he took during his training career – and his surprise when he realised he was far from alone among his peers.
Even as the most prolific British trainer of all time, Johnston attracted his share of criticism from the racing public. He admires the way son Charlie copes with the slings and arrows, but also knows it comes with the territory.
“You don’t expect that kind of abuse when you start out, and it was a couple of years before it began, but it can get pretty brutal,” said Johnston, speaking to the Racing Post for a major interview in Sunday’s newspaper.
“It’s got better – the National Trainers’ Federation employs a man who goes and chases these people up, which has helped – but you spend a long time thinking you’re the only one, and it’s only when you’ve been at it a long time that you talk to people and realise we all get it.
“I remember William Haggas saying to me once that I never got upset or worried about anything because I didn’t have any of the pressures he had, and there was me thinking exactly the same about him.
“I don’t know if the public think of trainers as a generally fairly relaxed bunch, but it’s a bloody hard job from the point of view of all the flak that gets thrown at you.”
Not that Johnston has ever shied away from the bullets. In fact, there were times when he stuck his head above the parapet just for fun.
“When I was writing for The Sporting Life and the Racing Post, [wife] Deirdre used to ask why I went upsetting people every week and getting all these letters,” he recalled. “I said they got nothing for writing them and I got 10p a word for replying in my next column, which I always enjoyed.”
Read more from Mark Johnston in The Big Read, available in Sunday’s newspaper or online for Racing Post+ Ultimate subscribers from 6pm on Saturday.
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