'For 15 years I was a busy fool. Now I want a sensible life, not a crazy one'

It has been 17 years in the making and it will all be over in 24 hours, but for Adam Kirby securing fancied rides in the Derby and Oaks represents a personal milestone. It has bestowed on him the seal of approval he has always craved.

The jockey was always shortlisted to partner Ed Dunlop’s Derby hope, John Leeper, and he was almost certainly going to ride Saffron Beach once she was committed to the Oaks, having partnered the filly to finish runner-up in the 1,000 Guineas. The bigger surprise is that Kirby has only ever had three rides in the Epsom Classics.

“It just shows how hard it is to get one,” he says from his home at Vicarage Farm, near the Newmarket hamlet of Kirtling. “My one Derby ride was on Dubai Thunder for Saeed Bin Suroor [in 2017]. It was only the horse’s second start, he finished down the field [behind Wings Of Eagles] and never ran again.”