Gay Kindersley

Gay Kindersley was a British champion amateur jump jockey, horse trainer and a "drinker, gambler and serial womaniser". After Oxford, Kindersley joined the 7th Hussars, and served in Germany. At the age of 21, he announced that he wanted to get married, so his family sent him to Canada, where he worked as an oil rig "roughneck", and as a Calgary Stampede rodeo competitor. On his return to the UK, he continued as an amateur jockey, and in the 1959–60 season, won the amateur jockeys' championship with 22 winners from 100 rides, all but five of the 100 on his own horses. Kindersley broke his back at Stratford in 1955, and again at Hurst Park in 1962, after which his doctor told him to stop riding; he ignored the advice, and continued. He retired as a National Hunt jockey in 1965, and as a flat racing jockey in 1969. Before he retired, he started work as a trainer at East Garston. He always wanted to win the Grand National, and in 1984 his horse Earthstopper came fifth but collapsed afterwards.