Pappa Fourway was a powerfully built bay horse standing 16 hands high[1] bred in County Tipperary, Ireland by the Ballykisteen Stud.
Dutton (1901–1958) had been a successful amateur jockey, winning the 1928 Grand National on Tipperary Tim before training major winners in both flat and jump racing.
[5] On 24 June, he carried a weight of 133 pounds in the Gosforth Park Cup at Newcastle Racecourse and won by three lengths from ten opponents.
Such was the impression he had made in handicap races that only two horses appeared to oppose him and he won "easily"[6] by two lengths from the 1954 winner Vilmoray[7] and Royal Palm.
In July, Pappa Fourway contested the King's Stand Stakes at Ascot and won by two lengths from Democratic, to whom he conceded fourteen pounds in weight.
[8] Pappa Fourway contracted a respiratory infection which affected many Yorkshire-trained horses in the summer of 1955, forcing him to miss the Nunthorpe Stakes[9] which was won in his absence by Royal Palm.