Past Is Merely Prologue for Piggott : Comeback: At 54, legendary European riding champion wins the Mile.

The biography of the greatest European rider of the 20th Century had been written. The highlight video of a 37-year career had been on sale for five years. The game was over for Lester Piggott. Even the man who won a record nine Epsom Derbies could not hold off the relentless entry of Father Time and the tax man.

And then two weeks ago, all of that changed. That’s when the 54-year-old Englishman decided to return to the saddle, encouraged by trainer Vincent O’Brien, with whom Piggott shared many of his greatest triumphs.

It took Piggott, who spent a year in prison for tax evasion after he gave up riding, two days to ride his first winner since 1985. It took him 12 days to win a $1-million race, which he did Saturday on Royal Academy, who rallied to take the Breeders’ Cup Mile in a photo finish.

Fittingly, Royal Academy is trained in Ireland by O’Brien, for whom Piggott rode four winners Tuesday at the Curragh. The 3-year-old colt also is a son of Nijinsky II, who was trained by O’Brien and ridden by Piggott when he won England’s Triple Crown in 1970.

Royal Academy broke slowly from post one and was last in the field of 13, but Piggott let him settle into stride on the Belmont backstretch. He was ninth at the half-mile pole and eighth, four lengths off the lead, with a quarter-mile left. Piggott switched him to the outside and Royal Academy accelerated strongly.

Flu prevented O’Brien, the 73-year-old “Wizard of Ballydoyle,” from coming to New York, so his 23-year-old son, Charles, filled in for him. Vincent O’Brien’s wife, Jacqueline, also made the trip.

“My father was instrumental in getting Lester to take his riding license out again,” said Charles, who as a boy saw Piggott win four Derbies for his father.

Vincent O’Brien has trained three winners of the Grand National and six Epsom Derby winners.

Said Jacqueline O’Brien: “The greatest pleasure for Vincent is to have Lester ride for him.”