The trainer might have given up hope - but Richard Johnson hadn't

Greatest Festival Rides - No. 8
Richard Johnson (Anzum, 1999 Stayers' Hurdle)

It’s a good job for many that we were still a couple of years away from the inception of Betfair at the time of the 1999 Stayers’ Hurdle. Had in-running betting existed at the time, there would have been carnage.

Anzum looked every bit of the exchange’s ceiling price of 999-1 for much of the race. He was on the back foot from the word go and, at the top of the hill for the final time and with two still to jump, commentator Simon Holt summed it up succinctly as he scanned back through the field to see Anzum being "driven for dear life” by 21-year-old Richard Johnson.