ANDY Moloney is a member of a great band of friends who love their racing. He also happens to be my barber. A chance call to Boxx Barbers in the IFSC a couple of years ago resulted in my meeting Andy, and discovering his interest in the sport of kings.

One of Andy’s racing highlights each year is to pay a visit to Cheltenham. This he did with a host of pals – they have a revolving door system of coming and going that allows a great number of them to spend all or part of the week at the Festival. A key member of that group was David Clerkin, more affectionately known as Drogheda Dave.

An avid football and racing fan, Dave saw nearly every race at the Cheltenham Festival since 2010 until his untimely death following a tragic accident in Copenhagen in November 2018. He was a familiar face at many Irish tracks too, and across the water, while last year’s Festival in the Cotswolds the racecard carried a tribute to Dave.

In it his friends wrote: “We had so many memories from Cheltenham over the years. We danced in the rain when Our Conor won the Triumph Hurdle, we laughed when our friend Gerry left £500 notes in a lampshade and burned his money, and we cried when we heard the sad news about JT McNamara.

“As a friend Dave was selfless to the core. He always put others before himself. Dave was passionate about everything in life. Full of energy, fun, devilment and always ‘up for the craic’. He will be missed by an enormous amount of people, including his family, friends, colleagues and his longstanding Cheltenham pals for whom the Festival will never be the same”.

That group of pals are worth naming too – Paul Boyle, the aforementioned Andy Moloney, Mark Kavanagh, Sean Cantwell, Jimmy Duffy, Brendan Heeney, Kieran Delaney, Gerry Doyle, Colly Walsh, Colly McCullagh, Ronan Doyle, Johnny and Jason Breach, Niall O’Leary, Cian Brady and Paddy Morris.

In his professional life, Dave was an employee of First Auto Finance and they represent Close Brothers in Ireland – a nice twist given that the company have been a Festival sponsor for some years. Such was the esteem in which Dave was held by his employers that they named their offices on Pembroke Road after him – Clerkin House.

At this stage you have some idea of Dave’s popularity – a man who will not be forgotten.

His friends have since embarked on a new journey, one that they hope will shine Dave’s light on the racing scene for a while yet. They are in the process of establishing the Dave Clerkin Memorial Racing Club and the group of friends have their first horse. The plan is to name the steed Drogheda Dave.

With Paul Boyle as the driving force, more than 40 people have joined the club and last year they commissioned Gerry Hogan to pick them a winner. He went to Goffs and paid €16,000 at the Sportsman’s Sale for a Pearl Secret colt, already a half-brother to five winners.

The colt will be trained by Henry de Bromhead, but presently he has been in pre-training with Mick Murphy, a man known to bring on many a good winner.

While the circumstances leading to the establishment of this club are sad, the friends have been given the blessing of Dave’s parents Rita and Jim who joined members on a recent visit to see the colt. At Murphy’s he is looked after with great care by Ronilton Da Costa, better known as Ronaldo.

In the coming weeks and months this column will follow the career of ‘Drogheda Dave’ the equine, and hopes to be able to share the experience of being a part-owner of a horse in Ireland.