Frankie Dettori was in Dublin yesterday, playing the game as well as ever. The game in this case being the Esat Digifone Irish Champion Stakes which will be run at Leopardstown on Saturday week.

"It's now one of the great races of Europe," beamed Frankie, as he stood behind a podium addressing a roomful of Irish racing's great and good. "Since Esat Digifone sponsored the race four years ago, many great champions have run in it."

The two air hostesses from Emirates Airlines - the Leopardstown contest is part of racing's world series - smiled on either side of him. Managing directors and chief executives of various companies greeted each other and corporate Ireland hugged itself with satisfaction. Frankie really is the marketing man's dream. Hacks were attracted to the Italian superstar's city centre hotel in the sort numbers normally raised only by the prospect of a free bar.

Dettori only had to turn and he was faced by a microphone or a pad. And no one went away disappointed. "Great, great. He's just brilliant," twittered one earnest scribbler. Positive copy guaranteed and the frantically upbeat executives and PR fondlers congratulated themselves again on their wisdom of choice.

It looked like the same old Frankie. The only jockey you could possibly imagine even enjoying Top Of The Pops, never mind presenting it. "Seven-Up" Frankie who entered Britain's national consciousness to such an extent that John Prescott even cracked a joke about him at the Labour Party conference.

"The only Tory you should back is Frankie De-ttori," was the Deputy Leader's gem, but beyond yesterday's surface there was no need to be Freud to recognise an altogether different Frankie.

Hardly surprising since it's less than three months since he almost lost his life in that appalling air crash that claimed the life of the pilot and resulted in fellow jockey Ray Cochrane dragging the seriously-injured Dettori from the burning debris. He's riding again, and will ride Godolphin's Best Of The Bests against Montjeu in the Champion Stakes, but away from the cameras he seems a much more reflective person than the PR might allow.

The deep tan is highlighted by the white shirt collar but there are still a number of healed scars on his forehead that hint at Dettori's experience and how he has coped with it.

"I still have the odd bad day," he admits and you believe him when he says that returning to race riding was difficult. When you believe, as he did, that he was going to die then the outcome of a photo finish gets put in its proper context. Yet it was racing that got him back so soon.

"Dubai Millennium made me come back. He made me push myself beyond what I thought were my physical and mental capabilities and then . . .," Dettori grins at the irony that when he became fit, the horse he considers the best he's ever ridden, incurred a career-ending injury.

"But the best counselling I had was from my family, some great friends and those closest to me. It has been hard to get through. I don't have to tell anybody that I've been lucky and all I can say is `thank you God' for giving me another chance.

"When I returned to riding, it was nice to be back, but it was weird too," he says. "It took me a week to jump back into it properly. I enjoy my job and I've achieved most of the things I want to achieve in it but now I want to enjoy it more. Both for my sake and my family's sake."

That will mean a selectivity in the horses he rides in the future which will rule out any further addition to the two jockeys championships he has already notched up. There will be no dogfight such as the one currently in progress between Pat Eddery, Richard Quinn and Kevin Darley. "The demands are too much. There is so much pressure from owners, trainers and the public that you find yourself in a spiral and you can't get out of it. How many other sports people would go to work, lose money, and carry on? But that's what is required if you are to travel in search of winners. It's out of control," he says. Retaining as much control as he can is important to the 29-year-old who says that being in the public eye, and playing the media game, is not the sort of oppressive existence that some of his colleagues seem to believe it is.

"First of all racing is a public sport and entertainment so I can't help being in the public eye. And second I'm doing this for myself, and the industry as well. I want racing to be better so while the going is good, I'll do my bit and go for it," he says.

Racing should realise its luck.