Britain’s longest-serving point-to-point correspondent has filed his final article.
Brian Lee, 87, who lives near Cardiff, has been reporting on Welsh point-to-points since the 1960s, but his review of Saturday’s meeting at Ystradowen is to be his last.
He said: “I am fast approaching my 88th birthday and find I am slowing up. Back in the 1960s I was reporting on the success of Vale of Glamorgan's Rhys Williams and his wife Mary, and when they hung up their riding boots I had the pleasure of reporting on the success of their son Evan, who is now Wales's leading National Hunt trainer. These days, it's Evan's two daughters, Isabel and Ellie, that I am writing about.”
Lee attended his first point-to-point in 1952, but joined the press pack when sending his first meeting report from a fixture at Cowbridge to Horse & Hound magazine. He became an ever-present feature at meetings across Wales when it had a very busy fixtures’ list and far more courses, and his articles were subsequently published in the Sporting Life and a number of local papers. The Western Mail's racing editor, Brian Radford, gave him the job of reporting on the Welsh point-to-point scene, and that gave him the confidence to become so involved in the sport he loves.
He went on to write an acclaimed book charting the history of the Welsh Grand National, several other racing books, and around 25 more on his beloved home town of Cardiff.
In 2016 he was presented with the John Ayres Award for his services to Welsh point-to-point racing and four years later he received Welsh Horse Racing's Lifetime Achievement Award.
He said: “Over the years I have interviewed royalty, rogues, rascals and on one occasion
a Countess.” No less impressively there was also the occasion when Anne, Princess Royal, visited the Golden Valley meeting at Bredwardine in the Welsh Borders as the owner of a runner.
“I was the only reporter there that had the courage or cheek to approach her,” said Lee. A photograph capturing that moment appears in his book Racing Rogues – The Scams, Scandals and Gambles of Horse Racing In Wales, not that there is any inference that the princess was involved in any underhand dealings.
Brian Lee, who first reported on Welsh point-to-pointing in the 1960s
Lee met many of his racing heroes over the years, none with greater impact than Sir Gordon Richards, who was Britain’s champion Flat jockey a remarkable 26 times. Coming face to face with the great jockey, shortly before his death in 1986, Lee said: “We met at a Chepstow Racecourse press luncheon, and I was delighted when Sir Gordon signed my menu card. When I mentioned Lord Glanely, whom he had ridden for in days long gone by, his face lit up.”
However, his attempts to convince his hero that as he was born in Shropshire on the Welsh border that he was in fact Welsh failed to work.
Lee is not completely mothballing his pen and will continue to write local articles for the fortnightly Glamorgan Advertiser.