Edward Gillespie never made a crisis out of a drama Even when things did go wrong, such as the abandonment of the whole meeting in 2001 because of foot and mouth after a few innocent sheep had grazed a distant car park and the Racing Post ran the headline "Silenced by the lambs" it never really stuck. My favourite Gillespie story was when Istabraq won his first Champion Hurdle in 1998. Fed up with the throng of Irishmen who wanted to accompany the horse back into the winner's enclosure, it was his misfortune that the one that the one man chose to kick out was Istabraq's fresh-faced trainer, Aidan O'Brien. Gillespie had believed he was an Irish schoolboy playing truant. The only part of the Cheltenham grandstand that has yet to be redeveloped is exactly the same age as Gillespie. Perhaps he thought it was time to go before they were both bulldozed out of the way in the name of progress.