‘When you’re in the moment and you’re starved, you’re ready to explode - everything built up and I just lost my s**t’
Richard Forristal speaks to riding legend Davy Russell after the launch of his autobiography
Davy Russell is perched at the granite island countertop in the kitchen of the sumptuous home he shares with wife Edelle and their four kids in the east Cork seaside town of Youghal.
He is shooting the breeze with Ken Budds, a lifelong friend who trains nearby in Killeagh. They've always trucked about together, and Budds features prominently in the first act of Russell's recently released autobiography.
Budds's brother Martin died in a car crash in 1997 and Russell's trademark big-race victory routine of raising his arms aloft, looking to the sky and gently flapping his hands was in honour of him, a tribute that had its origins in the 1994 bull-riding film, 8 Seconds.
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Published on inThe Big Read
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Copy- 'I don't want to be part of this narrative that Irish trainers are better than us - I think that's rubbish, it drives me nuts'
- 'The grief hits me quite a lot - so many people think I'm really tough but I get terribly upset by things inwardly'
- 'The numbers went in the wrong direction and you're an idiot if you don't think about it - but you back what you're doing'
- 'My wife wants to know why I'm reading the sales catalogue in bed - it's relentless, but you have to be on it all the time'
- 'I know people will say they've heard it all before - but when I see Constitution Hill now, he's suddenly developed quality'
- 'I don't want to be part of this narrative that Irish trainers are better than us - I think that's rubbish, it drives me nuts'
- 'The grief hits me quite a lot - so many people think I'm really tough but I get terribly upset by things inwardly'
- 'The numbers went in the wrong direction and you're an idiot if you don't think about it - but you back what you're doing'
- 'My wife wants to know why I'm reading the sales catalogue in bed - it's relentless, but you have to be on it all the time'
- 'I know people will say they've heard it all before - but when I see Constitution Hill now, he's suddenly developed quality'