On Wednesday we announced the ten winners in our Sporting Post 30th birthday readers’ stories competition – read more here.
Selwyn Elk writes that he was at Clairwood on a wet Saturday afternoon in the 70’s.
At the time he ran the SA Racing Mirror and was good friends with the late Syd Laird, who by then had already trained a number of July winners.
He approached me before the last race and said that he was in trouble and did I like anything to “ get out of it on”.
Syd Laird, with Ralph Rixon (left) and Bert Hayden (Pic – Supplied)
I told him his own horse would shit in, a filly called Daphnis.
He gave me all the reasons why it couldn’t win as it had been out of work and would need the run.
I pointed out to him that the filly loved the wet and thought it was a ‘good thing’. That’s where our conversation ended, or so I thought.
The race was won by the odds-on favourite, a top class colt called Border Knight, trained by Reg Passmore.
I never gave it another thought until we were driving home, my partner Tony Dumas told me that the ‘Bear’, which Syd was known as, because of his occasional grumpy moods, had a message for me.
“Tell that damage merchant never to tip me hosers again, particularly my horses,” he said.
Needless to say after telling me his own horse couldn’t win he still fell for it.
He later told me he was on his way to back the eventual winner and I lumbered him into his own horse.
It just shows how easy it is to fall in om this game, a champion trainer falling to his own horse, which he gave no chance and listened to an ‘ordinary punter.
