Sadakshara Reuben Padmanabhan — affectionately known as Paddy — was more than a racehorse trainer; he was an institution whose life bridged continents and generations. Revered in India and abroad, “Sir Paddy,” as the British called him, belonged to that rare breed whose mastery transcended mere statistics. From Byramji to Shroff, from Hughes to Dettori, Paddy`s touch shaped champions and souls alike — his legend immortalised by devotion, discipline, and quiet genius.

The life of Sadakshara Reuben Padmanabhan, spans time and continents.

He was known to everyone in India and in racing circles around the world as ‘Paddy`. His career bridged the era between two other titans of racehorse training in India, Rashid Byramji and Pesi Shroff.

In the UK, Paddy was re-christened ‘Sir Paddy`, respectfully, by his fellow trainer and friend, four-time champion Richard Hannon Snr.

When I say era, the breadth of his achievements is not defined merely by sterile statistics: Classic winners or a mountain of successes are never the complete measure of a man. For Paddy had an air about him – not one of self-conscious surety of outcomes but yet the man to provide them, a fact Sharan Kumar on India`s Racing Pulse stood by in his valediction for Paddy entitled “The Mastermind who rewrote Indian Racing script”. As a eulogy there is nothing to add to Sharan`s work, other than one`s personal encounters with Paddy and with the jockeys from this side of the world who, without exception, revered both him and his widow Sharmila.

A measure that means as much as anything was the esteem of foreign jockeys who beat a path to his door: Richard Hughes, Martin Dwyer, Frankie Dettori and latterly David Allan who, by their own admissions, returned home better ‘knights of the pigskin` for the experience of riding for him. (Forgive that indulgence of nostalgic description of riders of bygone days. I only wish to position Paddy`s place in history – a career that, to repeat, has spanned eras).

“Paddy was a good man, a gentleman,” said Martin, Derby winner in England on Sir Percy and winner of an Indian Derby for his boss on In The Spotlight. “Mahalaxmi is much like Ascot and Derby day there is unique. Paddy was my go to man. Ray Cochrane got me into him in Bangalore and I never regretted it for a day. But don`t omit the huge part Sharmila played.”

Many of the stable`s horses ran in the colours of Sharmila Padmanabhan`s bloodstock company; the green and pink could easily be mistaken for those of Juddmonte, and included the latest triumph – Miracle Star winner of the Mysore Derby a week after Paddy`s death, ridden by Suraj Nareddu who took the Ascot Shergar Cup day in September by storm. You couldn`t imagine a more personal send off.

And again there is a sustained link to highlight. Miracle Star is trained by James McKeown, stepson of the late Sir Henry Cecil. James was seven years Paddy`s assistant, and based in Madras where Paddy began. McKeown is last of a long line of British handlers who, for their various reasons, plied their trade in India. That they did so is emphatic proof of the bond between the Indian and the British Turf.

And if I digress here, it is to highlight a personal context to Paddy`s place in racing chronology. My first experience of Indian racing was delivering, in the 1980s, a stallion and a couple of mares from the UK to the Palace Stud in Bangalore. It was maintained by an Englishman, Sam Hill, who had been supreme trainer in South India in the post-war years, the first trainer in the world to go ‘through the card` with all the winners, at Ootacamund in 1969. He stood Red Cockade and King Charlemagne and his mares at the Maharajah of Mysore`s Summer Palace in Bangalore, occupying stables and the elephant houses. Sam and I spent many hours on the verandah of his bungalow reminiscing over our racing heroes.

Sam had handed over the reins in Madras to his son David Hill who went on to train successfully in Hong Kong where he had a champion – River Verdon. David died in the same week as Paddy. James McKeown is the last inheritor of a line of British handlers tracing back to the inception of racing in India at Madras, established only a quarter of a century after the Jockey Club in England in 1750. I am proud to have a copy, from the 1770s, of that famous depiction of the Madras training grounds with the huge Union Jack unfurled atop the grandstand.

The breeding of racehorses in India has always leaned heavily on its links with the UK and Paddy was heavily involved, wearing his other hats as bloodstock agent and breeder. ‘Got abroads` and the progeny of imported stallions have forever ruled the roost in India but personally I took exception to a leading British bloodstock prognosticator rubbishing Indian breeding when writing “Because of the tropical climate and poor soil in India, the foundation of a viable breeding industry in India has proved impossible.”

Tell that to the commandants of Usha, Poonawalla, Nanoli – apologies to the line, too long to mention, of exemplary studs in India.

With his forays abroad and achievements at home Paddy tried to disprove such notions that India could not compete on an international stage. When Desert God, bred, owned and trained by him, and as good a racehorse as India has delivered, failed to acclimatize to British surroundings, after carrying all before him in 2015/16, the naysayers had their day.

Richard Hughes, consecutive British champion jockey 2012-14, to whom Desert God was, at the start of his training career, entrusted was categorical: “Paddy was the best I rode for out there. He knew how much a horse could take – Remember Flame (dam of Desert God) was a good example, the harder he pressed her the better she became – and she bred a champion. Paddy would have made his mark as a trainer anywhere he chose. He taught me that invaluable virtue - modesty, how to behave. When I shunned publicity he said,: ‘Remember Richard, the Press is a privilege` and I`ve never forgotten his words.

“The racing is different in India. “They gallop on rock hard ground, here we expect them to get their toe in. The change certainly didn`t suit ageing Desert God when Paddy did the honour of sending him to me in 2017.”

David Allan has had a particularly fruitful partnership over ten years with the Padmanabhans. “R I P Paddy,” said Allan. “I did well in India due to this man who took a chance on me as a young jockey (as Paddy had done with Martin Dwyer) and he gave me the opportunity to ride Indian Derby winners (Desert God and Hall of Famer).”

Allan has overtaken all the past greats who set up stall riding in the winter in India. He became, for the Padmanabhans, the most-winning foreign jockey of all time on the sub-continent.

“The highlights of my career were Paddy`s Indian Derbies,” said Allan, “along with my first home Group One, the Champions Sprint on Art Power, at Ascot last year. I have always found it amusing, if that`s the right word, that Indians view racing as either taboo or a money making scheme. No rules for driving – endless ones for racing.”

He could have been referring to the struggle, which Paddy eventually, deservedly won against the Turf Authorities who tried to incriminate him over horse medication.

The bond between David and Paddy and Sharmila was strengthened by his absence in 2024. Allan was never a peripatetic jockey on a whistle stop tour of the world`s racing capitals.

“I`d check up all the time on how Paddy, Sharmila were getting on. It`s all a bit sad at the moment with their crushing taxes, a lesson for British racing. And now Paddy`s presence is no more. Shame India hardly gets a mention in racing circles. The local jockeys know every blade of grass and Paddy was a master of tactics. His instructions were peerless.”

Allan, annual ‘Cock o` the North` in the UK echoed his contemporary visiting jockeys saying “India, under Paddy and Sharmila`s direction, improved me when I got back home. Except it`s not quite so brutal here,” here he added.

Continents are united by horseracing. Nowadays a jockey can be riding in Australia one day and, jet lag permitting, in the UK the next, or Japan, or America. But gone are the winter days when most top foreign jockeys would head to India for the season. In the latest Derby at Mahalaxmi last February five top foreign jockeys, including current British champion Oisin Murphy and his likely successor Tom Marquand, were imported though none made the first six home.

Paddy might well have been knighted for his services to racing had he trained in this country where his accomplishments would surely have matched those at home. I am indebted to Major Nargolkar, former Registrar of the Indian Stud Book and of course an admirer of Paddy for informing me that though he had good patronage he did not reach saturation point, as did others, with the mass owners of the recent past, such big-hitters as Vijay Mallya, Dr Ramaswamy and Deepak Khaitan.

There are totems round most racecourses of the world – great horses, great men and women, trainers, jockeys, administrators. And the celebrated figures of India`s past adorn every major site in India. But if they grace Indian racecourses I have missed them – false gods perhaps? Were there to be such a pantheon, Padmanabhan, ‘Sir Paddy`, would certainly be placed amongst them.