I always liked the story where Cecil had booked Geoff Lewis to ride two of his at Nottingham, but Piggott rang him up and explained he'd take the rides as Lewis was riding at Catterick. Cecil agreed. Lewis saw the declarations and rang up Cecil and asked why he wasn't riding for him. Cecil explained and Lewis said 'But Catterick's a jump meeting'.
Lester really was a bit of a sod! You know, on reflection, he was very lucky he didn't cross swords with one Alan Munro, who holds more than one black belt in assorted martial arts. Munro used to take long sabbaticals in China and Japan in the study of these combat practices. Ask former jockey Richard Quinn, who was silly enough to sass-off Munro once, much to Quinn's pain and embarrassment. Munro got into a fair bit of trouble with the stewards over this. Alan's now safely ensconced in Singapore, I believe, a much calmer fellow and doing quite well, although, fellow jockeys, don't cross him!
Apparently he's quite a generous man really. Other than watching him at the races I've chanced upon him twice. Once in Joburg when he was over for a jockey challenge. I spotted him and only had a cheque book so declined to ask him for his signature on it. He was with Ronnie Corbett, which as you can imagine looked rather comical. He just mumbled a hallo which is more than we got from Corbett. The second time was about 10 years ago in Newmarket when I was passing a few hours one morning at the museum. I went into this room where they had a mechanical horse and the female attendant asked if I'd like to try it. Can't think why as I'm over 6ft but I had a go as there was no-one about and I felt a bit sorry for the attendant. 2 rather hot and uncomfortable minutes later I clambered off to be met with the amused gaze of Lester who then gestured for his son to get on and show how it should be done. He seemed very happy and nodded hallo again.
I met the great man just once, at Bath. My then boss was a dedicated Timeform member and Timeform sponsored a race in his name (The Jock Johnstone something). I was one of his guests and when I saw Lester walking in I got him to sign a race card. I don't think I had a winner that day.
