ALAN Munro didn't own a suit when he first started work as a tiny 16-year-old at Barry Hills' Lambourn stables a decade ago.
He was fresh from school, could hardly sit on a horse, weighed 95lb wet through and had to rattle the poor can to find the change to ring home. He was lucky in one way.
Not all apprentices have such decent blokes as Brent Thomson as the stable rider and the kind-hearted Thomson took pity on Munro giving him a couple of his old suits to wear on special occasions.
The joke doing the rounds the last couple of months since Munro arrived fresh from taking yet another of the world's top Group One races - this time the Budweiser International in Washington DC - is that he is still wearing them.
But it is only a joke as the 26-year-old Munro has come farther in the last five years than any other jockey of his generation. In fact he has come so far that he is now one of the world's most sought-after riders with big-race victories to his name not just in England, Ireland and America but also in France, Italy, Germany and Spain.
Gone are those impecunious days when handouts from Thomson made all the difference and trainers such as Newmarket handler Sir Mark Prescott would slam down the phone at Munro's temerity at daring to ring for a ride from the local call box.