A half-century ago in the early stages of a long and distinguished training career, Barry Hills engineered the defeat of French darling Allez France with the relatively unheralded Rheingold. Now 86, he speaks to JA McGrath about a memorable day in Paris
Fifty years ago this weekend, a cracking four-year-old with an unglamorous pedigree galloped away with the 1973 Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe at Longchamp, becoming only the fifth British-trained horse to win Europe’s greatest race.
His name was Rheingold, and he was a magnificent winner, claiming a record purse as he mastered the formidable champion French filly Allez France, who would go on to triumph the following year.
What is more, the victory was notable for other landmark reasons – not least in that Rheingold was a first Arc winner for the legendary Lester Piggott, who had been lambasted when beaten on Park Top (1969) and Nijinsky (1970).
Such a famous victory in Paris also marked the biggest win in the fledgling career of 36-year-old trainer Barry Hills, who had taken out a licence four years earlier, propelling him to a new status level that eventually led to his training for an elite group of owners.
Always a shrewd cookie, Hills had set himself up as a trainer via his gambling prowess and he won the modern-day equivalent of about £185,000 ($225,000) by backing Rheingold at 12-1.
A tidy sum for any young trainer, though the winnings paled alongside the approximately £1.1 million ($1.35m) Hills collected in his time as travelling head lad for John Oxley with a winning gamble on Frankincense in the 1968 Lincoln Handicap.
A bit to spare
That was enough to set him up in the training business … and with a little left to spare.
The man who won five English Classics, five Irish Classics, two Ascot Gold Cups, countless G1 races across Europe – and gave Steve Cauthen his first European Classic winner aboard Tap On Wood in the 1979 2,000 Guineas – sent out around 3,450 winners before retiring in 2011.
Hills’s family is now one of the best-known in British racing circles, and among the most successful. Hills’s sons Michael and Richard both rode with distinction as jockeys at the highest level, while eldest son John was a G1-winning trainer before his death in 2014. George is in equine insurance in the USA, while Charlie trains a sizable string from Faringdon Place stables.
A racing dynasty created and an incredible lifetime in racing full of outstanding achievements – all the more remarkable considering that Hills battled throat cancer in 2006, which ultimately led to an operation to remove his voice box, larynx and Adam’s apple.
Plenty on which to reflect then, as I arrive at Barry Hills’s home on the outskirts of Lambourn on the r
oad to Seven Barrows, adjacent to Faringdon Place stables, where son Charlie has enjoyed a good season.
The late morning sun is streaming through the windows to the palatial living room, where Barry sits poring over a Goffs sales catalogue. “I won’t be long,” he says, focusing on a pedigree that is clearly worthy of his added attention.
At 86 years of age, he looks well; his mind is sharp and his interest in the game has never dimmed.
Armchair memories
We are meeting to talk specifically about Rheingold and his Arc success five decades ago – was he the best he trained? Had the preparation for the Arc been smooth sailing?
But does Barry Hills sit in that armchair of a morning, reflecting on the day, October 7, 1973, when he was catapulted into the major leagues? “Not really,” he replies.
“There have been so many good days and we made them good days. I had a lot of good horses and Rheingold would have to be the best.”
Rheingold had been beaten a whisker in the Derby at Epsom in 1972, overwhelmed by Piggott on the Vincent O’Brien-trained Roberto in a rough finish that is still talked about. Piggott himself believed that Ernie Johnson, on Rheingold, should have thrown caution to the wind and ridden him out, then argued his case in the stewards’ inquiry over interference that would inevitably have taken place.
Sixteen months later, with several major wins on the scoresheet, Rheingold was being aimed at the Arc, arriving at his toughest assignment after a second failure in the Benson and Hedges Gold Cup (now the Juddmonte International) at York, where he was only third to Moulton.
“He ran another stinker,” Hills admits. “Maybe he didn’t like York. After that, we put him away for the Arc.”
If he didn’t care much for Knavesmire, Rheingold certainly loved Paris. He’d already claimed the Prix Ganay and two editions of the Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud and now he was taking aim at the big one.
“He broke a couple of blood vessels but we got him right and he did a very good piece of work,” says Hills. “After that, I had a thousand on him at 12-1.”
Hills always put his money down when he felt it was the right time, and this was clearly the right time. But if the trainer was in confident mood, though an outsider’s perspective might have wondered why.
Rheingold faced 26 rivals, including not only one of the greatest fillies in decades, Allez France, but also her great rival Dahlia.
Unwavering confidence
Hills, though, was unwavering. “He was just right on that particular day,” he explains. “He was at his absolute best. I don’t think any horse …” – he stops mid-sentence to adjust what he is about to say – “the only horse who could have beaten him that day would have been Sea-Bird.”
That fabled equine legend had won the Arc in 1965 in a canter – in the process producing the highest Timeform rating of the 20th Century. Incidentally, Allez France was a daughter of Sea-Bird.
Hills continues: “Rheingold beat Allez France and she had won everything, the Prix de Diane, the Prix Vermeille, everything – and he beat her 2½ lengths. Then she comes back and wins the Arc the following year!”
By any measure, the 52nd edition was a very good running of the Arc. In a sense, Rheingold was the ultimate party pooper, with the vast majority of the 65,000 crowd at Longchamp that day imbued with patriotic fervour expecting to witness a coronation for their darling filly. Instead, they got Lester Piggott throwing previous criticism back in their faces.
Piggott’s connection to Rheingold had been forged in controversial circumstances on a train from London King’s Cross to York, when a posse of partners that were pulled together by Lloyds underwriter Tim Sasse decided that the ‘Long Fellow’ should be riding the horse in the Benson and Hedges instead of French champion Yves Saint-Martin, who had been booked and jocked up on official racecards.
Henry Zeisel, the owner of a London after-hours drinking club/nightspot, was the original owner of Rheingold, having paid 3,000gns for the yearling colt at public auction. He named the horse after the Wagner opera Das Rheingold, inspired by his time as a violinist with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra before he settled in Britain.
On the eve of the 1972 Derby, Zeisel sold 80% of the horse to Sasse and his associates, Tony Shead, Sir William Piggott-Brown, Charles St George, John Welles-Poley, Paddy Bowen-Colhurst and Fred Wicks.
C’est bizarre
A number of the associates were on the train that day, and they took a decision that ultimately ended up before the stewards. Hills is adamant that the one partner in particular drove the motion. “Charles St George,” he says. “He and Lester w
ere great pals. Lester had talked him into getting the owners to put him on. The stewards questioned me but it was the owners’ decision.”
Saint-Martin arrived at York, only to be told he would not be riding Rheingold because he had been replaced. “C’est bizarre,” he exclaimed – and it was hard to argue.
Then again, those who had witnessed Piggott jocking off Australian jockey Bill Williamson before winning the Derby on Roberto were hardly surprised. And Piggott’s pivotal role in Roberto’s subsequent victory has never been questioned.
Moreover, you won’t need telling the identity of the jockey aboard the vanquished Allez France in the Arc. Of course it was Yves Saint-Martin.
Mind you, as prestigious as it was, Hills claims that Rheingold’s Paris triumph in Paris had little immediate effect on his training operation, though it certainly cemented his position as one of the rising stars in the ranks, heralding a bright future and longstanding associations with the likes of Robert Sangster and senior Arab-based owners such as the Maktoums and Khalid Abdullah.
“You never do get orders,” he muses, “and, no, we didn’t stay in Paris and celebrate that night! We went straight home.”
That last sentence seems surprising. Was he too tired to celebrate? “I didn’t get tired in those days,” he retorts with a characteristic grin.
Rheingold was retired soon after. “He got a leg (injury) after Paris and he never ran again,” the trainer recalls.
Rheingold stood at stud in Ireland from 1974-79, after which he was sold as a stallion to Japan, where he died in 1990.
But the horse’s positive contribution to Hills’s career wasn’t quite over yet. One of the progeny from his time in Ireland was Gildoran, who won two Ascot Gold Cups for Hills and long-time owner and friend Robert Sangster, in 1984 and 1985.
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