Frankie Dettori will sell more than 120 pieces of memorabilia from his legendary career in an online auction through Cheffins in Cambridge starting on Wednesday, July 5 and continuing for two weeks. Dettori, who has been aboard more than 4,000 winners throughout his career, is set to retire from the saddle in November and says he is selling the items because his children have moved out of their family home and he his wife are scaling down in a move to be closer to London.
“I'm going to be 53 and I wanted to stop at the top,” Dettori said. “I still feel that I'm riding well enough to finish at the top. I think it's the right time. My heart doesn't want to stop but my brain is telling me to stop. It's not going to be easy. We're going to move away from Newmarket. Newmarket's been my life. We're scaling down and I've got so much stuff, we thought we might as well just auction it. I didn't realise because they end up in drawers, in cupboards, in the cellar. I mean they're all over the place. Now we're clearing up a lot of stuff we didn't realise how much accumulated in so many years.”
Among the items on offer are signed jockey weighing scales, which were gifted to Dettori by Steve Cauthen and which he claims he has been “jumping on and off for over thirty years”, and the trophy from his final win in the Oaks this year.
Part of the proceeds will go to the charity Direct Aid for Africa (DAFA), and some will go to Dettori's five children.
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