Dorothy, Tinman, Scarecrow, Lion. Jack, Kate, Hurley, Sawyer, Locke. Romeo, Juliet, Tybalt, Mercutio.
No show is much good without a colourful cast of characters.
And so it is with racing and its long list of current and past stars, whose personalities and quirks have driven the sport into the hearts and the imagination of Australian racegoers and the wider community since the early 1800s.
In my opinion the best salesperson we have in racing right now is the woman often referred to as “the first lady of Australian racing”, Gai Waterhouse.
The daughter of the late, great Tommy Smith, Gai’s name, face, infectious smile and laughter scream horse racing to even those who aren’t regular racegoers.
When no surname is needed (i.e. Madonna, Ringo, Cher, Kobe) you know one’s comfortable being in the spotlight.
Gai’s willingness to sell the virtues of racing via media interviews, book launches, luncheons and photos ops is worth more to the industry than it could ever afford via its advertising budget.
“People call me the face of racing, and I can walk down the street and people recognise me. I say to people, ‘I try to take racing from the back pages to the front pages’. I’m there to promote the sport, and I try to make sure people come to the races and enjoy it like we do,” Waterhouse told The Daily Telegraph earlier this week.
Like Kevin Sheedy in the AFL, whose position in history is assured as a four-time AFL premiership coach, Waterhouse’s record will see her forever remembered as an absolute legend of racing.
While Sheedy and Waterhouse will go into the annals as the best in their fields, so too will they own the tag of “great and colourful characters”, whose efforts to promote their sport helped it prosper to the masses.
Anyone can jump in front of a microphone and take questions; few make answering them an art form like Waterhouse and Sheedy.
Bart Cummings is another type of character whose one-liners and quips have won him and racing fans over a long and illustrious career.
The winner of 12 Melbourne Cups said at his book launch in 2009: “Is that all? You’ve got me working for nothing!” when asked about the book’s $50 cover price.
When asked about his training philosophy, he said: “Be patient, feed them well, be kind to them and they will look after you, the same as you do with humans”.
There are many others, past and present, who have played strong roles in promoting our great sport.
The late George Hanlon was one of racing’s true characters, regarded by all who knew him as an absolute legend of a trainer and legend of a bloke. He once said “horses are only human”. It’s a great line.
Ross McDonald, who trained the mighty Weekend Hussler, said before the Oakleigh Plate that punters should put the house on his mighty steed. “And when he wins you’ll have two houses,” he declared.
In the jockeys room you’ve also got an array of charismatic types with vastly differing personalities.
Let’s start with Craig Williams. Have you met a friendlier bloke?
Williams is genuinely into promoting the sport.
He once booted home a winner at a run-of-the-mill Saturday meeting at Flemington then immediately after weighing in made a beeline for the small group of people getting the ‘Flemington tour’, quickly giving them a background on his saddle and handing out a couple of free hats.
Now I’ve been a racegoer for most of my life, but I just happened to be in the tour that day, and most of the people in that tour group had never been to the races before. They absolutely loved this bloke, who was clearly in the know, taking the time to come and say hello.
No inflated ego whatsoever for ‘Willo’. And you know what? He’s in my view the best jockey in the world.
I could name a stack of other hoops and why they’re also great for racing, but we’d be here all day.
Owners, too, have a key role to play to keep racing prominent in the minds of newspaper readers and nightly news TV bulletin viewers.
Who could ever forget Nick Moraitis after Might And Power’s biggest wins? What about Tony Santic, his hair and Makybe Diva, or John Singleton, who has been known to shout the bar at racecourses in celebrating one of his horse’s successes?
My favourite though has to be Anne McGrath, the Warrnambool woman whose unbridled joy was caught on camera as Tears I Cry caused a massive boilover in the 2007 Emirates Stakes at Flemington.
She was jumping up and down like she’d just won, well, a Group 1 at Flemington. It was brilliant.
Somebody made the comment immediately afterwards that her reaction was the best Racing Victoria advertisement one could ever imagine. I couldn’t agree more.
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