DESPITE more than 30 years in Yorkshire, Richard Fahey is still more “Divil a bit” than “nowt” in accent and turn of phrase. In deed, however, he is neither. No other British-based trainer has turned out more winners in a flat season, while this decade has illustrated his ability to handle Group 1 horses too.

He will be at Royal Ascot on Tuesday to oversee stable star Ribchester’s appearance in the Queen Anne Stakes but will also have charges at Thirsk and Beverley too, attempting to add further to his spiralling winners column.

At present, he leads Mark Johnston and Richard Hannon in the race to record the first century of the campaign. The thirst for success is relentless.

As a Louth native, Fahey does have plenty in common with the denizens of North Yorkshire, which he has called home for the majority of his life now. The Wee County is perceived as northern in much of the rest of Ireland and is overlooked in many ways. Certainly, Fahey is no stranger to graft.

A former champion conditional jockey – he shared the honours with Derek Byrne and Stuart Turner in the 1988/89 season – he quickly came to the conclusion that he was always going to be a bit-part player, as the likes of Adrian Maguire, Mick Fitzgerald, AP McCoy and Richard Johnson succeeded him on that particular roll of honour.

After a spell trading, he took out a trainer’s licence in 1993 when Tom Dyer, an owner he used to ride for, asked him to train a handful of horses. He trained one winner each on the flat and over jumps from Manor Farm in Butterwick, just outside Malton.

How he has developed since then to match Richard Hannon snr for the joint highest tally of winners in a British flat season with 235 in 2015, is one of racing’s great rags-to-riches stories.

In the meantime, a Saturday rarely passes without him bagging one of the lucrative pots, and he has also accumulated five Group 1 races to date.

He is reunited now with Paul Hanagan, who he helped make champion apprentice and then dual champion jockey – only the third northern-based pilot in 105 years to do so. Their almost 16-year partnership ended when the jockey’s success earned him a retainer with Sheikh Hamdan Al Maktoum, but when that association ended, it was a signal for the resumption of an old one. Hand and glove come to mind so a double century could be on the cards once more after falling just two short last term.

There is plenty of top-tier talent too that will add to the CV in lustrous terms but Ribchester stands apart. It is difficult for those that follow racing but do not have practical experience with horses, not to mind thoroughbreds, to understand that ability is no guarantee of success. These are not machines that can be programmed. They are individual, can be wilful and to make matters worse, are unable to communicate with humans – in words at least.

PATIENCE

Fahey’s handling of Ribchester has been exemplary. Patience is an underrated virtue, the lack of which is at the root of plenty unrealised potential. Fahey knew he had something special and told us often enough too but they have to do it on the track.

The son of Iffraaj and first foal to the aforementioned Sheikh Hamdan’s Derrinstown Stud mare Mujarah is now the highest-rated flat racehorse in Britain and Ireland on a mark of 124, only behind Arrogate (134) and Winx (132) in the global ranks.

The comprehensive manner of his Lockinge victory at Newbury was notable, especially when he cut out the running on testing ground. This, remember, was a colt that had been known to over-race and took until his third run to shed his maiden status.

He then finished third in the 2000 Guineas and the Sussex Stakes, while also bagging the Jersey Stakes at Royal Ascot 12 months ago and the Group 1 Prix Jacques Le Marois at Deauville. Getting to within half a length of Minding in the Queen Elizabeth II at Ascot was probably his best run though, particularly as pulled very hard and still stayed on stoutly. Minding’s injury may mean there is no rematch but Fahey who, while accepting that the super filly might also have improved, certainly won’t be fearful should it occur.

“I’ve always felt he had the potential to be a champion, you know?” says Fahey. “Last year was a frustrating year for him. We did get his Group 1 and he ran some cracking races but it was probably part of his education and it brought him along. This year, he’s a lot stronger now, more mature mentally and physically. He’s probably a bit more the finished article and (people are) getting to see what we were seeing in the morning.

“He was just very immature mentally. He was wanting to do too much too soon but this year he’s been a star, he’s been very relaxed and we’re very comfortable with him.”

With the mile targets obvious from here until the end of the year, it is reasonable to expect that there is more to come, given that the Lockinge was only Ribchester’s second run of the season after finishing third in his opener in the Dubai Turf at Meydan, and he had to do all the donkey work in Newbury.

“I’d hope so and would think so. I feel he looks better, which is his way of maturing physically. Do I think he’ll be a better horse at the end of the season? Yes I do. We’re improving. We’re not going backwards. We’re getting better the whole time.”

There is a different pressure to the expectation that comes with having these kinds of inmates but it is what Fahey is in the game for and certainly preferable to wondering if you can pay the bills at the end of the month.

“We’re very privileged to have him. The prep is going 100% and you just hope he performs on the day. We all know horses can have off-days. With a horse of this calibre, you only have five or six shots at the target and you just hope on that day, everything has gone well and he performs.”

The flat season has a different rhythm to jumps when now, more than ever, each race is deemed a trial or build-up to Cheltenham, with Aintree, Fairyhouse and Punchestown concluding proceedings.

On the level, the show rolls on, the global stage offering riches and glory everywhere – Meydan, Newmarket, Epsom, the Curragh, Goodwood, Leopardstown, Chantilly, Del Mar, Flemington, Happy Valley and so on. Royal Ascot is a little different however.

“You always feel that Royal Ascot is the Olympics of the flat racing season. It’s the World Championships as such. Everyone is very keen to get a winner there. All the top horses in Europe and sometimes the world are there. It’s extremely competitive and great to be part of it.”

FIVE TIMES

Fahey has enjoyed the glow of success at Royal Ascot five times but he still gets that frisson of anticipation leading up to the week.

“Oh God yes. It’s the be-all and end-all. If you don’t get anything out of the week you’re disappointed. If you do, you’re ecstatic. It’s probably one of the few weeks that gives you that feeling. It’s everything and you just hope you get something out of it.”

Superior Premium broke through the glass ceiling for the then 34-year-old Irishman in 2000, under the guidance of compatriot Johnny Murtagh.

“He’d been third in a Wokingham and fourth in a Cork and Orrery (now the Diamond Jubilee) and then went on to win the Cork and Orrery. He’d never gotten the right draw before. He ended up rated 120 and got beat in the Wokingham off 96, so you can see how difficult it is. You need everything in your favour. To get a winner there at a very young age in my training career was fantastic. That was a great day for us. I really enjoyed it.”

Ribchester provided number five and the fact that it came for Godolphin certainly added to the occasion.

“When you see the enjoyment Sheikh Mohammed got out of it. You’d think a man of his standing, it wouldn’t mean a lot but you could tell that he was happy and that gave me extra pleasure. If you don’t enjoy days like that and don’t enjoy weeks like this, you’re in the wrong game. As I said earlier, everybody wants a winner there, whether you’re a breeder, owner, trainer or jockey. It’s a special occasion.”

Fahey has plenty of entries in the Royal Hunt Cup, the Wokingham and Ascot Stakes and must always be respected in such prestigious handicaps. Queen Kindly patently didn’t stay the mile in the 1000 Guineas and will now be campaigned back over shorter distances. She could be a major player in the Commonwealth Cup.

Notably, Fahey is operating at around a 19% strike rate with his two-year-olds so far this season and so his juveniles will have to come into the reckoning, headed perhaps by It Dont Come Easy, who set a course record in Musselburgh a fortnight ago.

“We’re happy with them but to win a two-year-old race at Ascot you need a special horse and when I say that, you need a horse with plenty of speed. That’s one thing I’ve learned over the years, that the pace of the two-year-old races is a lot quicker than they’ve ever been. If you’ve got a pacey horse that’ll lay up, I think it gives you a very good chance to run a race.

“I have maybe three or four two-year-olds that we’ll work this week and make a decision from there. It Dont Come Easy could run in the Coventry Stakes, Simee’s Copshop in the Windsor Castle Stakes. We’ll make the decision when we look at the entries.”

With about 180 horses and instances where he might have more than 30 horses travelling to five different tracks on a given day, one can only imagine the logistical nightmares. An operation as vast as Musley Bank is reliant on organisation – it is reliant on staff.

“Hey look, our industry is run on staff. If I think I’m doing it all I’m kidding myself. I’m heavily reliant on the team and I’ve had great staff. They work hard and they know what to do. I’m only pushing the buttons, they’re doing the work. There’d be 75 of us here now. From the lads that muck out to the team that work in the office and my assistants, I like to think it’s a family here.”

He will never turn a horse down. Being a Group 1 trainer hasn’t made him any less enthused by the challenge of solving a puzzle.

“I get great pleasure probably more from winning a 0-60 rather than winning a Group 1 with Ribchester. You really feel you’ve achieved something. It doesn’t bother me what they win as long as they win. I’m in a lucky position. I’m doing a job I love. It helps me get up every morning.”

The addition of Robin O’Ryan as assistant was a key appointment for Fahey in 2005, coming as it did around the same time as his switch to the now 230-acre Musley Bank. O’Ryan’s cousin Bobby, and Bobby’s son Aidan (Mouse) buy a lot of Fahey’s horses and are key elements of the thriving firm.

“The biggest part of our job is getting the right horses. You can have all the money in the world but if you don’t buy the right material, you’re at nothing. I’m very lucky to have been involved with Bobby and Mouse and they’ve been a huge help to me over the years. They do an awful lot of the groundwork. I would have the final say but mostly now, anything they like, I like. It just depends on whether we can afford them or not.”

Despite competing at such an exalted level now, and though the likes of Godolphin and Cheveley Park have the capacity to send him more expensive horses, when it comes to going to the sales, he is generally operating on a budget.

Speaking on these pages, Aidan O’Ryan quoted Fahey as saying they were like the Dingles of Emmerdale fame going down to Newmarket. Bobby O’Ryan purchased Fahey’s first Group 1 winner, Wootton Bassett, for £46,000 and that invariably is the type of price tag they are still looking at.

“It’s not being disrespectful to ourselves but that’s the clients we’re dealing with. Whether we give 100 grand for one or 15 grand, it’s still a lot of money to the fella that’s investing so we like to do our best for everybody.”

CHANGED

Training has changed a lot since he started. Like everyone else, he is always looking for an edge but is loath to change a horse’s routine. A self-confessed traditionalist, he is not resistant to improving facilities and a treadmill has been installed recently. But with science and technology evolving so rapidly, he must differentiate between what is a fad and what is useful.

“At least once a month we have a fella coming in saying ‘This is the new Messiah’ and you’ve to decide whether it’s going to benefit them or hinder them. I think training has gotten a lot easier since I started. You’ve got excellent all-weather gallops and the feed companies have spent millions on producing a product where you know they’re being fed properly. It used to be a big thing years ago, trying to get the feeding right.

“You’re always looking at things but I’m probably a little bit old fashioned. Keep their minds right. If somebody can invent something that can keep horses’ minds right he’s a genius and he’ll be a millionaire. That’s the most important thing in training horses. If you’re feeding them right, and it’s easier to do now, keep their minds right and keep them healthy, you’re halfway there.”

Fahey has gone a long way towards removing the absurd notion that high-class horses cannot be trained in the north, along with Mark Johnston, David O’Meara and Kevin Ryan, his current difficulties notwithstanding.

“There are some great trainers in the north. You could reel off 10, 15 very good trainers here. There might be a little bit of a north-south divide as far as the big owners are concerned but all you have to do is look at Epsom. Most of the handicaps were won by northern horses. Mark Johnston has changed that quite a bit and luckily a few of us are starting to back him up.”

Is it snobbery?

“I don’t think it’s snobbery but I do feel that London is a great base for some of these bigger owners to go to. From London to us is two hours. Two hours doesn’t sound a lot but it is a bit, especially if you’ve flown in from the Middle East or something like that. Another two hours is a day away.”

IRELAND

He would love to send horses to Ireland more often but doesn’t see too many opportunities given the calibre of trainer and horse racing here. Winning a classic would be the next box to tick.

“You feel you’re competing at the top level once you’ve had a Group 1 winner but until then we didn’t have a Group 1 horse and we knew we didn’t have one. We felt Wootton Bassett was and luckily he won the Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere. Good horses are very hard to come by. You see the investment that goes into the industry. There’s only a certain amount of Group 1 horses there and a lot of them don’t even go to the sales, so to pick up the likes of Wootton Bassett there for about 46 grand, it’s a rarity but it does happen.”

He did, of course, have a Grade 1 winner in the Heineken Gold Cup at Punchestown 20 years ago, as Noyan and Norman Williamson trounced Bobbyjo by 15 lengths.

“That was a good day actually. I enjoyed that.”

He doesn’t have jumpers anymore, finding it even more difficult to justify the outlay required when there isn’t the same potential for a return on that investment.

You have to remind yourself that he is such a winning machine. Would he favour the champion trainer title being judged numerically rather than on prizemoney, on which terms he finished second to John Gosden two years ago?

“I’d have been champion trainer the last two years if it was so you can make what you want out of that!”

He laughs good-naturedly. Royal Ascot, Thirsk, Beverley or Nottingham, Ribchester or his 66-rated half-brother Golconda Prince, Fahey cares only that his steeds are winning.

Happy horses? Happy man.