SIR Tom Jones allayed late fears he would be a non-runner for the 8.50pm at York Racecourse, overcoming the respiratory infection that had put paid to his concerts at Saint Tropez on Tuesday and in Germany on Thursday.

The prospect of seeing Sir Tom – the biggest favourite on the Knavesmire course since Frankel – had drawn a sold-out crowd of more than 30,000 for the Friday combination of six races and the septuagenarian sex bomb himself.

Sir Tom arrived with some 20 minutes to spare from Leeds Bradford to front a band well grooved from the summer festival and open-air season for a set list that emphasised just how seriously the Welshman takes the art of singing, whereas the post-racing crowd in the stands would chatter and content themselves with watching on the screens, waiting for the big numbers.

Only Mama Told Me Not To Come, Sexbomb and Delilah in the first dozen would have been instantly familiar, as the sound drifted down Knavesmire, and Sexbomb was magnificent, starting as a slow-burning blues before erupting like a volcano into a swing singalong.

Such "informal" concerts, however, could never satisfy the purist, for all craft and charisma of Sir Tom, interpreting the likes of Gillian Welch's Elvis Presley Blues and Leonard Cohen's Tower Of Song with such elan, coupled with the high quality of the screen graphics and the lighting throughout. Not to mention the fabulous brass section, who added swaggering oomph, as the Welsh flags and the ladies' knickers flew in the night air.

The limitations lie in the structure of a racecourse, not the performance. Unless you were close up, the sight lines were not ideal, either from the stands or if your view was impeded by the structure slap bang in the middle that controlled the show's technical demands.

Nevertheless, treat it as an event, a race night with a living legend, then it could still make you join Sir Tom in saying "Oh Yeah" when he concluded with Thunderball, a lip-smacking Kiss and Sister Rosetta Tharpe's Strange Things, on the night Knavesmire became the Green, Green Grass of Tom.

Sir Tom Jones returns to North Yorkshire tomorrow to play Scarborough Open Air Theatre.