Brendan Sheridan

When I was still riding a position to join the Turf Club was advertised and I took a chance in applying for the role and I was fortunate enough to get the job - that was 21 years ago - and on Tuesday I will officiate at Ireland’s most unique fixture at Laytown.

I am now Clerk Of The Course at eight racecourses in Ireland, one of which is Laytown, and as anyone can imagine it is very different to your normal race meeting but it’s very enjoyable.

I would have been at Laytown a few days ago having a look at the banks to see what way they were and when I was there on Saturday everything was fine but the tide will come in and out each day until racing so really until I get there on Tuesday I won’t know what track we are going to be racing on.

You just don’t know what way you are going to be left when the tide is gone out. It could be fine, it might need a lot of work or there might be very little work to be done but we’ll know more at 12pm when we get there.

The tide will be gradually going out at that stage but we’ll have everything ready to go and we’ll hopefully be down on the beach from about 1.15pm onwards and we can start lining it up then and forming the track. With the first race at 5.05pm and the fact that you are starting the entire track from scratch, it can get very stressful under the time constraints. There’s a lot of arguments and a lot of running up and down but we always get it done and I’m lucky to have great help. It’s all part and parcel of it.

Joe Collins is there, Sean Ryan from Punchestown, Noel Fanning from Fairyhouse and Willie Gibbons from Leopardstown are all on site and all the local tracks help us along and without them we’d be struggling.

The finishing post is the same every year and when you walk down from that and look back the track you may have to go a bit left or a bit right - it’s rarely ever going to be dead straight - because you have little undulations or little ponds and all those things have to be dealt with on the day and James Black is there with machinery to deal with that so there is an awful lot of work but when it’s ready to go it’s usually smooth enough.

There’s been some years where we would have been right up to racing time before we got finished but I have an assistant tomorrow, Paddy Graffin, and he’ll deal with any issues in the enclosure as I’ll be on the track right up until the first race trying to make sure everything is in place and good to go.

It’s a big week as I am also Clerk Of The Course at the Curragh where we’ll have the second day of Irish Champions Weekend on Sunday and before that I also have Down Royal on Friday so it’s pretty hectic.

The racing at the weekend is the créme de la créme of racing and it is something to really look forward to. There has been a lot of activity off the track at the Curragh this year but the racetrack itself is a fantastic racetrack. Aidan O’Brien is on record as saying it is the best racetrack in the world and I think it is a wonderful racetrack. It’s very fair and the best horse always wins and the track is in super, super condition and Pat Webb does a tremendous job there maintaining the track.

I’ll go to the Curragh before Laytown tomorrow and every day this week just to keep on top of how things are going. They say we are going to get a nice drop of rain tonight and it is unsettled then after that so really we don’t know at this stage how we will be looking for Sunday and I’d like to think the ground won’t be much worse than it is at the moment.

Watering won’t be an issue for this weekend but I’d probably say that is the hardest part of the job for any Clerk Of The Course. In racing you never water to slow ground down, you just water to maintain ground and to keep the sting out of the ground. Proper flat ground is good to firm and no jar in it and that is what we try and do. In racing you will never please everybody because not every horse likes the same ground but you try and have it the best you can for everyone but it is a difficult job when you have to water to achieve that.

All year around I would be inspecting or racing on the eight tracks that I’m Clerk Of The Course for and different things will always pop up that you have to deal with but the majority of people in the game are very good, we’ll have a chat if there’s any issues and we’ll talk it out and the most important thing I do is to try and have the ground safe for everyone.

On the day of the races you’ll be there three and a half hours before the first race starts to walk the track, to go through the conditions of the races that are taking place, then you’ve to get the meeting going, getting the jockeys out, getting the races started on time. If there’s fallers or horses injured we have to deal with that, if anyone reports anything on the track we’ve to look into it so really, the job of a Clerk Of The Course on the day, is to run everything.

We think the tracks at the moment have improved and the managers at all the tracks are doing great work across the board and I know the jockeys feel that the tracks have improved leaps and bounds.

When I started with the Turf Club I did a lot of judging, which I really enjoyed, but now it is mostly the ex-jockeys that are the Clerk Of The Course’s in Ireland and the way we look at things is that we’ll try and present every track as I’d like to ride around if I was still a jockey or if I was a trainer I’d like to run a horse there.

I was fortunate enough that I rode 500 winners in total as a jockey. I started with the Walsh family, working with Ruby (senior) and then Ted and I was 25 years with them and then I rode as first jockey for Dermot Weld for a number of years. I was fortunate to land on the right horses but I won an Irish Grand National, a Galway Plate and most, if not all, the major races in Ireland and I also won a Triumph Hurdle on Rare Holiday for Dermot Weld at the Cheltenham Festival.

That was a great day. For any rider to have a winner at the Cheltenham Festival is very special. I was very, very lucky in the game and when you think how long I am finished now, I suppose 500 winners wasn’t a bad amount.

I’m in racing since I was 10 and racing is my life. I absolutely love it.