The racehorse diet

Being married to Rose, one of the greatest cooks in the country, is an especially pleasurable thing. No meal is ever dull. Breakfast can be a variety of treats from toast to scrambled eggs to a fried venison liver. Lunch is usually a sausage, perhaps some lentils or something leftover from the evening before. Dinner kicks off around 6 p.m. with a cocktail or two followed by wine. In winter we are great consumers of game, partridge, hare and pheasant. Thick creamy curries, poached fish, beef dripping with red blood. Great hunks of homemade bread lashed with butter and topped with a piece of artisan cheese. There are always leftovers. Rose has no concept of frugality — although we waste little and recycle a lot, the portions are always too big which means the naturally greedy can get stuck in. After 15 years of marriage, I creaked the scales at 16-and-a-half stone. Then, three years ago, after one particular bout of excess, I decided that the time had come to act.

Willpower and discipline are not my strong points. If I was going to lose weight, I had to have something to aim for: a sporting endeavour, perhaps an adventure. Climbing a mountain, running a marathon, swimming the Channel — they are all things that can be done whatever weight you are. I needed a clear goal.

Since I was a child I have had a fascination for and love of horses. I have ridden them for pleasure, worked with them, made films about them and written about them. It was the thought of the racetrack that prompted the eureka moment. No 16-and-a-half stone jockey has ever ridden in a race, let alone won one. So I decided that was what I would do — ride in a race. I’d have to lose nearly five stone; it was a great motivation.