Meet the pensioner attempting a challenging fundraiser in support of the Injured Jockeys Fund

The Front Runner, Chris Cook's popular daily email, was recently named the specialist/regional newsletter of the year at the Press Gazette's Future of Media Awards. Written principally by our award-winning senior reporter since its launch in 2021, it has become a beloved part of our Racing Post+ package.

Here you can read a free sample of the award-winning newsletter, normally available exclusively for Racing Post+ subscribers.

Subscribers can get more great insight, tips and racing chat from The Front Runner every Monday to Friday. Those who aren't yet signed up for The Front Runner should click here to sign up and start receiving emails immediately!

Not a Racing Post+ subscriber? Click here to join today and also receive our Ultimate Daily emails plus our full range of fantastic website and newspaper content.

I've known Will Lefebve for quite a few years but, until last week, I'd never asked him to pick a favourite moment from his time spent in and around horse racing. His answer will give you a useful insight into how long he's been following the game.

"No question, Morston winning the Derby in 1973," was his immediate response. He'd seen the horse in question winning on his debut at Lingfield and clocked that he was a half-brother to the same stable's Blakeney, winner of the 1969 Derby.

At the time, Will was working for the Press Association, compiling lists of runners and riders for publication, a job that has since, of course, been taken over by Weatherbys and computerised. Back in those days, practically Dickensian by comparison with 2025, trainers would sometimes phone the PA for bits of information which they could now get in seconds from the internet.

Arthur Budgett, trainer of Morston (and also his owner-breeder), rang one day. Will took the call and, after helping as much as he could, dared to ask about Morston.

In an ideal world, the response would have been some variant on the theme of "Now is the time to bet like men." Budgett, however, was in the mood to be conservative: nice horse, bit immature, not certain to run.

Ex-racehorse trainer Arthur Budgett, pictured with his 1973 Derby winner Morston, is one of only two men to have bred, owned and trained two Derby winnersCredit: Racing Post

But he did run and Will decided to back his faith in the horse, taking some 25-1, the price at which he was eventually returned. He was at Epsom to see his long-range fancy surge into the lead, then feel the joy start to curdle as he recognised his hero, Lester Piggott, mounting a late charge on Cavo Doro.

Thankfully, half a length remained between them at the line. Will bagged enough to buy a car. He has owned five different houses during the subsequent half-century and called all of them Morston.

Will reads voraciously on his favourite subject, so I don't need to tell him that the Racing Post's historian John Randall has called Morston the worst Derby winner since Spion Kop in 1920. Love is blind to careful analysis and, anyway, Morston might have been a world-beater if injury had not intervened.

"Very happy memories," sighs Will. And they would have to be, to come top of his list, considering he has been racking up racing-related experience for 75 years.

"I would have gone racing with my dad in short trousers, possibly as early as the late 40s," he recalls. The father in question was Len Lefebve, jockey, trainer and eventually race-reader for Raceform. Will's uncle was another jockey, Tim Hamey, who rode winners of the Gold Cup and the Grand National.

The 1932 Grand National was won by Forbra under Tim HameyCredit: Getty Images/Douglas Miller

With a heritage like that, Will had no chance of getting away from the game. He started out at Raceform, joined the PA and spent the final years of his career working for the Tote. He seems to have enjoyed it all immensely and is still not entirely retired, as readers of his local fish-wrapper, the Brighton Argus, will be aware.

At the end of this year, the 80th birthday looms. Will has decided to mark the occasion with a fundraising effort in support of the Injured Jockeys Fund. He will attend a raceday at every British track in the six months leading up to his favourite week, the Ebor meeting at York.

His schedule looks hectic. We still have 59 tracks, some with a limited number of fixtures, so it's taken a lot of planning and there will be several days when Will must shift briskly from an afternoon card to an evening one elsewhere; Huntingdon to Chelmsford and so on.

He's doing it because he can and, I think, because he feels a debt is owed. Hamey was cared for by the IJF in his final years.

Star Sports bookmakers have, he tells me, agreed to swell the pot by letting him have a free £25 bet on the first race at each track he attends. So far, he's hit two winners out of three, though the firm will not have been ruined by his bet on Kopek Des Bordes at Cheltenham the other day.

In case anyone should feel like chipping in, Will has set up a JustGiving page here, underneath a picture of him standing with some familiar reprobates: Darley, Eddery, Roberts, Fallon, Dettori. It was taken on the day Rock Of Gibraltar won the Gimcrack.

The IJF tell me they're aware of Will's quest. "We wish him well and are very grateful," they say.

It seems an ideal way to spend a summer and I hope he enjoys it. "I've had a great life in racing," he tells the Front Runner.

"I've never been a big name but I've had a lot of involvement with a lot of smaller things. I've done bits of everything. I'm an organiser and I'm doing this as a big, big thank-you to the IJF, who do a fantastic job."

Read these next:

Watch out for these horses next time - they lost any chance at the start at Cheltenham last week 

Cheltenham Festival: Bookies barely ahead, despite four odds-on losers 

From Long Run to Shishkin, Chris Cook runs through his favourite Cheltenham Festival finishes - what are yours? 

'I'm going to be 67 on Thursday, I've been at this since I was 14' - trainer Pat Murphy reluctantly decides to bow out 

The Front Runner is our unmissable email newsletter available exclusively to Racing Post+ subscribers. Chris Cook provides his take on the day's biggest stories and tips for the upcoming racing every morning from Monday to Friday. Not a Racing Post+ subscriber? Join today