Dancer to lead the party

13 April 2012

There is going to be one heck of a party at trainer James Given's Lincolnshire yard if Hugs Dancer wins the Cesarewitch on Saturday. Given has already won the first leg of the Autumn Double - the Cambridgeshire - with I Cried For You, and if he clinches the historic second part as well, he will become the first handler in 76 years to achieve the feat. You have to go back to Sam Darling in 1925 for the last time it was achieved.

And about that party. Should Given pull it off, his staff will receive a £10,000 bonus and 1,000 cans of beer from the Tote sponsors to celebrate. Their chances look good and the French-bred gelding will be partnered by smart apprentice Jamie Mackay, who will take 3lb off his back in the two-and-a-quarter-mile marathon.

Given says: "He is not an extravagant horse. Some horses behave like hooligans when they are well, but he is a laid-back sort who just looks healthy."

Hugs Dancer has been a revelation as a stayer this season, since Given stepped him up in distance. Back in August he galloped the rest off their feet in a two-mile five-furlong handicap at Glorious Goodwood, coming home two and a half lengths clear of Gracalis to reveal that plugging on regardless is his forte.

Owned by Graham White, who is in the financial trade, and David Maloney, who has a pub-restaurant at Keswick in the Lake District, the four-year-old later got into trouble running at York where he was badly hampered, and then found the turning track and rain-softened ground at Chester against him. "Hopefully, it will be good ground on Saturday," said Given. "The Goodwood race was the key. There aren't so many races like that to judge extreme stamina against."

All creatures great and small fascinate Given, especially racehorses. The Gainsborough trainer is also a vet and his string is always certain of the best professional care available.

Hertfordshire-born Given, 35, went to Rugby School and from there to the Royal Veterinary College for five years, later moving up north to a mixed practice in West Yorkshire, where there was a lot of horse work. He then joined Mark Johnston, another trainer-vet, as his assistant for three years. at the end of which he won the Alex Scott Scholarship for assistant trainers. As a result, he went to Dubai in 1998 for the run-up to the World Cup.

Granted his own licence four years ago, he began training at Wolverhampton racecourse until moving to his present facilities, where his business partner Andrew Clarke attends to all financial matters. This leaves Given free to concentrate on the horses, which number around 70 and posted a winning figure of 21 victories and £123,000 last year.

I Cried For You was a favourite long before taking the Cambridgeshire. Given said: "He was my first ever winner as a new handler, won on my birthday at Doncaster and really put me on the map with that win at Newmarket. Now Hugs Dancer needs to follow his lead, and his price, at around 16-1, just about reflects his chances.

Given still has a soft spot for the formerly Johnston-trained Branston Abby. "She was so tough," he said. "When she was in season she loved you, but when it was over she would bite you as soon as look at you and was a right miserable cow. Yet she would run her heart out for you."

He knows the people in the game to whom he owes most - his owners. "They should get more recognition for what they put into racing. If it was not for their shelling out day after day, there would be no sport."

Given's continued success this season - his 20 victories have already netted him double the win and place prize money of last year and have just topped the quarter of a million pound mark - would make you expect that he was a real Flat racing devotee. But he still hankers after realising an ambition. "I'd love to go to the National Hunt Festival at Cheltenham on Queen Mother Champion Chase day. I have never been, but it strikes me that to win that race requires speed, courage and stamina - everything I admire in a real racehorse."

If Hugs Dancer fills that description on Saturday, Given and his workers will not be short of something to toast their stable hero with.

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