Life As I Know It (23 page)

Unfortunately Chad Schofield had come down on the corner on Albonetti. There was an enquiry. I thought the second horse, Le Roi, had shifted from the inside to a horse and a half off the fence. But in the stewards' room I tried to explain what happened in a way that wouldn't get anyone in strife, and somehow took the blame. In blaming myself, I copped the charge.

When I came out, Brad Rawiller and Dwayne Dunn weren't happy.

‘You go back in there and you tell the stewards that on the overhead shot there was a clear run for you to take, because they're going to get you for this.' When I was called back in to be charged for careless riding I pointed this out to Terry Bailey and his panel of stewards.

‘I'd just like to point out to you that on the overhead shot there really was a run for me to take and I don't believe that I should be blamed for the interference.' The stewards weren't having any of it.

‘You said there was no run,' they said.

‘Well, I was pretty rattled, because there had been a fall, and as we were pulling up, Glen Boss had given me a spray for taking the run through a gap which he'd opened up. But on the overhead shot, you can see there actually was a full run for me to take.'

The stewards just kept going back to my original words. I made no impression. Thankfully, Chad was all right, that was the most important thing. Me, I was suspended for twenty-two meetings.

My heart sank completely. The horse I loved, and had complete faith in, was possibly going to make the final twenty-four of the Cup field and I was going to miss the ride through suspension. I had to do whatever I could. I had to appeal. I took it to the Racing Appeals and Disciplinary Board. When we lost there, I took it further, to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal. We had lawyers and documents and diagrams and footage and explanations, but it was all to no avail.

The idea of
watching
Prince in the Melbourne Cup was devastating. But I was still hoping he would get there.

I was out for the whole Flemington carnival. It was very frustrating to be sitting on the sidelines watching. Signoff, ridden by Brazilian jockey João Moreira won the Lexus on Derby Day like a favourite should. He looked like a classic stayer who was right in the mix for the Cup. He was lightly weighted at 51.5 kilograms and was going into the Cup in peak condition and in hot form. Punters loved him. VRC handicapper Greg Carpenter thought Signoff had snuck under his guard, such was his improvement since the weights had been released.

The Melbourne Cup in 2014 was won by Protectionist, ridden by Ryan Moore. He exploded to the front over the final 200 and was by far the superior horse on the day. It was a very impressive win. João Moreira gave Signoff every chance and he ran bravely to finish fourth. Darren and Sandy were getting closer. I was still convinced Prince would win the Cup before Signoff.

Darren needed to find a replacement for me on Prince for the Queen Elizabeth Stakes. Hugh Bowman, a country boy from central New South Wales, now based in Sydney, took the ride. Prince ran second. It's the only time another jockey has ridden Prince in a race.

I came back for the Zipping Classic at Sandown a week after Cup week and again we thought about leading. Instead I sat third on the fence and he pulled terribly, really throwing his head around again. He didn't feel comfortable the whole way and in the straight when he wanted to fly we were held up. Once he was in the clear he still fought all the way to the line and actually came back to finish third.

Prince was due for a spell, but that was forced on him anyway. After the Zipping run he was very tender again, and it seemed he had yet another joint problem. He had to go back to the vets. The news wasn't good. He had bone chips again, in both fetlocks. When Ian Fulton operated he found they were very small and again
the surgery went well. But the odds of a third perfect recovery surely weren't good, although Ian was really positive.

‘He's made of good stock, this bloke,' he said. ‘He's certainly more robust and resilient than fragile. If he was a footballer you could patch him up and get him out there. He'd have three hundred games in him.'

While we had the family Christmas at Home, Prince was put just up the road at Laura Dixon's agistment centre to recover. Ian thought he'd probably need about eight weeks. One morning, towards the end of January, Laura noticed Prince was unwell. He was showing signs of colic, which is simply a term for abdominal pain. Within hours he was in a bad way. Painkillers were having no impact and Laura was getting really worried. She called the Ballarat clinic and Nicola Lynch went out to see him. She thought Prince needed urgent surgery, as he probably had a twist somewhere in his intestine. The extent of the damage was difficult to know. If the blood supply to parts of the intestine was shut off a lesion could have formed and this would need to be removed. The surgeon would have had to cut the section where that lesion was out and the intestine be reconnected.

Prince went under general anaesthetic. Lying on his back, four legs in the air, he was opened up. All 22 metres of soft, sloppy small intestine were lifted from his abdomen and thoroughly checked. The twist was found and sorted. It had happened quickly enough that there was no lesion. The small intestine was put back into his abdomen. It really was major surgery. The success rate on small intestine operations is around 60 per cent. When you consider Prince was also coming back from a bone chip arthroscopy, the chance of him getting back to his best was probably less than toss-of-the-coin odds.

We had to wait again.

T
HE SUMMER PASSED
slowly as I waited for Prince to recover. I wasn't hearing anything from his strapper, Maddie Raymond, or from Laura Dixon who was overseeing his recovery. That was good news. But I was enjoying being part of the Weir camp. Darren was going from strength to strength and with so many horses in his stable there were a lot of rides available.

Earlier in the year my friend Chris Symons, a jockey, introduced me to world champion surfer Layne Beachley and we got on very well. I found her inspirational. She seemed so genuine and I really liked how she was trying to help young women get started through Aim for the Stars, the foundation she had set up. When she asked if I would like to be involved, I was keen. Layne has an amazing story and the more I got to know her the more I wanted to do something with her. She knows struggle.

Born to Maggie Nickerson, who was seventeen at the time, Layne was adopted out. Then, when she was six, her adoptive mother, Val Beachley, died of a brain haemorrhage and Layne was brought up by another relative, Joan Tate. She grew up near Manly
in Sydney. A brilliant teenage surfer, she worked three or four jobs to make ends meet, and to raise the money to have a crack at the surfing pro-tour. One of the restaurateurs she worked for admired her determination and helped fund her initial attempt to break into the professional ranks. She went on to win the world championship six times in a row and then, later, a seventh title. She is so generous of heart; I could only aspire to be like her. I was more than happy to do my bit to help. Besides, it was fun.

The deal was I was going to learn to surf, and Layne was going to learn to ride a horse. The idea of the swap was to generate some media interest, and that would help promote the Aim for the Stars Foundation race meeting, which was to be held in March at Moonee Valley. Even though I am somewhat anxious when it comes to the ocean, one day in February 2015 we went to Thirteenth Beach near Geelong, where the waves really crash in. I'd never surfed before but with some brilliant coaching from Layne I somehow managed to stand up. Then we got her on to one of Sandy McGregor's horses, King Krug, a fourteen-year-old thoroughbred who'd had half a dozen starts many years before. Layne did pretty well on the old boy.

With Darren's stables being at Ballarat I was seeing quite a bit of Dad during this time, often staying overnight before trackwork at dawn. Using Dad's place as a base also took an hour or so off the drive to country meetings in the Western District, the Wimmera and the Mallee. It was good to spend time with Stevie too.

Early that year Dad just wasn't himself. He didn't look well and there were a few signs he was suffering silently. He didn't have that characteristic optimism, his good humour, the banter with Stevie. I thought he was crook. We all did.

‘You've got to see a doctor Dad,' I said.

‘I'm all right,' he'd say, dismissing it every time. But he was getting worse. We were begging him to go to the hospital.

He must have felt shocking on the night of Saturday, 7 March, because he finally drove himself to emergency at Ballarat Hospital. He parked out the front, leaving the key in the ignition and money on the seat. He must have been in a hurry.

The doctors completed a series of tests that showed he'd had a heart attack. By the time Therese and Margie got to the hospital he'd been placed in intensive care. Further tests revealed three arteries were blocked. A few days later he was transferred to the Alfred Hospital in Melbourne but his urgent surgery had to be delayed because of the blood-thinning drugs he'd been on.

I was no stranger to hospitals and was very worried. We all were. It was the first time I'd felt Dad was vulnerable. The heart surgeon operated on 16 March, his seventy-ninth birthday. The next days in intensive care were awful for him, and for the whole family. He deteriorated so much that Maree came from Hong Kong and Cathy from Sydney.

Dad couldn't hold down any painkillers and the doctors couldn't get a needle into his veins to give him any relief. He was so, so ill. On the Thursday he just wanted something that would make him feel better. Of all things he could have asked for, it was stout and lemonade. We were worried this would not be good for him. We knew we couldn't ask the nurses and I started Googling to see if drinking a glass of stout would be dangerous. I think I was Googling ‘stout and heart attacks'.

In the end, Dad couldn't keep the stout down and we had to try to hide the mess before the nurses came in and asked what was going on. Unfortunately, it was no joking matter. He was getting worse. I had to leave to get to Layne's Aim for the Stars night at Moonee Valley. Although the Weir stable was well represented, I didn't have a ride on the night. The race promoting Aim for the Stars was won by Nicoscene, ridden by Jordan Childs for Lee Freedman. It was a successful night, although my mind was elsewhere.

While I was away my sisters stayed with Dad. When I went to see him next, on the way home from trackwork on Saturday morning, he seemed even worse.

‘Little Girl,' he said. ‘I've told the Lord to take me. I can't handle this.'

I couldn't speak. I started crying.

‘I've asked them to get the priest,' he said.

‘Don't say that, Dad. You'll be right. This pain will only be for a short time.'

‘They can't do anything,' he said.

‘Dad. It's okay, you will be okay.' I'd learned a lot about inner strength from my father, and now I had to find mine to give to him.

‘Dad, stop talking like that. You're going to get through this.'

‘Little Girl, please,' he said. ‘Will you get me the priest.'

Dad was so consumed by pain, he thought he was dying. I sat there. Feeling so close to him. Yet he seemed so alone. I needed to let the others know what was going on.

‘I'm going to pop out for a minute,' I said. ‘Can I get you something?'

He wanted stout again. It was breakfast time and no bottlos were open. I quickly texted everyone: ‘You need to get in here as soon as you can. Dad's calling for the priest.' I took him back a banana smoothie. He couldn't drink it.

Nobody was ready for what was happening. No one could handle it. There were a lot of tears. We were concerned for Dad but we were also thinking of Stevie. How would he cope if Dad died? They were inseparable. Stevie sensed what was happening.

‘What am I going to do when you go away?' he asked Dad.

‘What do you mean, Little Boy?'

‘You know, you know, when you go away.' Stevie was so sad, but he didn't want to say the words. Dad helped him.

‘What, when I die?'

‘Yeah, that's it,' Stevie nodded.

When I left, Dad was still in agony and the situation seemed grim. I had to prepare for the Bendigo races that afternoon. It was the Golden Mile meeting. I was in the spa when Dad rang. He sounded no better.

‘How are you going with that priest, Little Girl,' he asked. ‘Have you got on to him yet? Can you get him to come and see me?' He was serious. I felt I had to do what he asked. So I rang Des O'Keeffe.

‘Dad's calling for a priest.'

Des contacted Father Brendan Dillon, the racing chaplain, and asked him to go to the hospital. Dad had known Father Brendan for years. They had met through Bob Skelton, a very successful jockey who'd also come from New Zealand and was a mutual friend. They would see each other at the races. Father Brendan was often at Caulfield and would come over to say hello. We all knew him.